Timeless
by J. E. Talveran
Summary: Three years after the dissolution of the Horde and the disappearance of their Warchief, Azeroth has finally reached a tentative peace. Jaina's arrival in Dalaran should have been a two-day trip discussing a trade of knowledge between the Tidesages and the Kirin Tor, but instead, Jaina finds herself caught up in the drama of the Windrunner sisters. A misadventure which seems to hav
1. Chapter 1

Three years after the dissolution of the Horde, Dalaran was once again the sparkling jewel of the northern territories. Returned to its rightful place alongside the southern shores of Lordaeron's Lake, the city's spires stretched into the sky and glittered in the afternoon sunlight. Dalaran itself still floated within the sky, but beneath its shadow, a lakeside town was steadily growing to support the efforts to restore the Hillsbrad Foothills - and the work of the mages within the city itself.

Dalaran's streets were filled with the hawking of merchants and the daily conversation of citizens rebuilding their lives without the threat of war looming over their heads. The people of Azeroth were finally at peace, and if Jaina Proudmoore closed her eyes and tilted her head up into the southwestern breeze, she felt transported back to the first time she'd ever stepped foot into the heart of the Mage's City.

Then her eyes opened, and the reality of the years between her arrival and this homecoming were stark and ever-present. The streets of Dalaran were divided still, though not as harsh as the rigid separation of the Horde and Alliance. No, instead, there was an undercurrent of tension between those who had dedicated themselves to the Army of the Light and those who hadn't.

True, as far as Jaina knew, all of the recruits within the Army had joined willingly, but the ranks of the Lightforged grew exponentially by the day, at a rate that concerned her. Still, she preferred this. It was the tension and bickering of priests and academics - the debate about how to best lead their collective people into a better era. This was not the bloody wars of Azeroth's recent past, or the tense truce waiting to be shattered by a opportunistic Horde. It was progress.

A jostle against her left shoulder shook Jaina from her thoughts. She scowled, stumbled off-balance as one of the Lightforged Draenei themselves materialized through the Dias - the arrival point of any magical travel into the city. The massive paladin must not have noticed her, for he continued without pause into the main street itself. _Just as well_ , Jaina mused, she had an entire checklist to complete before the sun set; starting with the acquisition of an appropriate room for her stay. Briefly, her gaze flicked up toward the Violet Citadel; and she wondered if she walked into the entrance hall, would Khadgar offer her a place to stay? For a heartbeat, she risked the idea, but the allure and luxury of the Citadel had faded sometime around the Purge. No, she shook her head. She should stick with simpler accommodations. It would make everything easier, for everyone.

Simpler accommodations turned out to be a good quarter-mile into the city at the Legerdemain Lounge. The inn was one of the busiest human-run in the city, and if Jaina wanted to get lost in the crowd, she knew it would be the place to do so. As she was dressed in a simple travel cloak with the hood pulled tight around her face, it would take more than a simple glance to discover her identity among the throng of patrons and frequent adventurers.

Sure enough, the Quel'dorei bartender, Arille Azuregaze, barely glimpsed up past the gold set upon the counter for a week's stay before he handed Jaina the runestone needed to enter and ward her room. She didn't even get halfway through a 'thank you' before he was off and focused on another patron requesting a refill.

Suited Jaina just fine. She shouldered her pack and made her way upstairs. She'd gone for one of the rooms that opened onto a private balcony that oversaw the Arcanist Gardens several hundred yards across the street. It gave her enough space to spread out the various scrolls and books she'd brought along to assist with her work without sacrificing a place for herself. The decorations were soft purples and silver over polished wood.

She busied herself with unpacking, though she had little to spare beyond the outfits needed for diplomatic meetings, and the scattered Tidesage codexes she'd been allowed to take from the Stormsong Monastery - gifts from one of the Alliance Champions who understood that knowledge alone was not a threat to be destroyed. Most of her clothes were plain-tailored, easy to slip in and out of, and easier still to blend into a faceless crowd. She allowed herself one small luxury, the anchor pendant that stood for her house. She unwrapped it from its cloth casing and clasped it around her neck. The metal was a pleasant chill against the mild heat of the late afternoon climate.

Unpacking finished, she found herself at a loss for what to do next. She had at least an hour to herself before she needed to set out for the Citadel and meet with the Concordance that oversaw the developments of the northern territories. She briefly thought about catching up on the latest research concerning the connection between the arcane and the elemental forces of Azeroth but found the thought slipped from her mind as quickly as it arrived.

Dalaran had once been her home. A sanctuary where she'd bloomed into a promising apprentice. Once, the city at sunset brought her nothing but peace.

Now, though, she was restless. Alone, her thoughts had a tendency to overwhelm her, just as they were beginning to do now.

Well, there was always the traditional method of drowning out one's inner monologue: she plucked a glass and the welcome bottle of Dalaran Red from the cabinet and headed out onto the balcony itself. The fresh air was not filled with the cry of seabirds and the salt of the ocean, but instead by the overlapped conversations of the streets and the various activities of the nearby craftsmen. Even with the revolving populace the city's seen over the decades, things never really changed - much like Boralus' port, Dalaran's streets were alive with the hawking of wares, the haggle of merchants and their too-canny customers. Craftsmen and smithies laid out their goods for perusal while tourists gawked at the splendors of life outside the small villages and outposts that most in Azeroth hailed from. Adventurers of the various Alliance races roamed the streets and fueled an economy that had evolved to exist around their constant forays into the dangerous parts of the world.

From the waist-high gnomes, the feral worgen, to the towering Draenei, the Alliance was more non-human than human now, but it stood united and strong, and the unity and peace it brought to the people of Azeroth was one of Jaina's dreams realized.

The Kirin Tor still stood guard, but among the spellweavers, Jaina noticed that some bore the telltale golden brands of those who had been Lightforged. They stood among their fellows, wearing both the Violet Eye of the Kirin Tor and the crest of the Naaru. Since when had the Army of the Light begun to recruit outside the Draenei?

Jaina continued to people-watch for a while longer. After her second glass was near empty, she spotted a familiar mane of white-blonde hair exiting the craftsman's circle. Even at a distance, the slender, elongated ears of an elf were noticeable. She grinned and Blinked down to land several feet from where Vereesa's Windrunner's path led.

Vereesa, for her part, barely blinked. Her ears twitched and swiveled back against her skull momentarily, like a cat spooked by a sudden noise, before they pricked forward and genuine interest and fondness twinkled in her arcane-touched eyes. "Jaina!"

Vereesa looked no different since the last time Jaina had seen her. The elves were ageless, beautiful and timeless. Jaina wondered how the years changed her in Vereesa's eyes as she crossed the distance and embraced her old friend. Vereesa returned the hug without hesitation, and the two swayed slightly as the crowd moved around the reunion without pause. "Vereesa! I didn't know you were in Dalaran still - I thought you'd -"

"Return to Silvermoon?" Vereesa finished for her, pulling back just enough to make eye contact. She paused, and rested her forehead against Jaina's for a second, then pulled away. "I haven't taken the offer yet. The twins have finally settled into their training, and I don't want to pull them from one style of teaching to another halfway through their first year." Her ears twitched as she spoke. "I'm surprised to see you here, though."

Shame briefly twinged over Jaina. She supposed a good friend would have written ahead to inquire and inform Vereesa of her arrival. If not for the wine lowering her guard, she probably wouldn't have done anything to catch the ranger's attention. "I'm here on business, actually. There are some old Tidesage texts we uncovered at the Shrine of the Storm, but they're untranslatable with any cipher we know about. I'm to ask Khadgar if I can borrow some from the Kirin Tor -"

"Which he'd gladly offer you, I'm sure."

Jaina wasn't as sure. Unlike Veressa, Khadgar had never understood, nor condoned any of Jaina's recent activities, and their differences in opinions in the last several years had eroded much of what had been a growing camaraderie. Add in Jaina's lack of support during the Final Invasion - as the Legion's advance was now being called - and the Kirin Tor themselves had grown cold to their ex-Archmage.

"Your brother? I thought you had been given the title of Lord Admiral?"

"I had - I am Lord Admiral - I just … we rule jointly. He's a beloved Fleet Admiral and …" Jaina trailed off. She didn't need to explain the frustration of residing in an older sibling's shadow to the youngest Windrunner. " … Kul Tiras is all the more healthy for it, and that's what matters."

"Of course," Vereesa answered diplomatically. She tilted her head up and sniffed at the air. "Now, I can practically taste the Dalaran Red you've opened. If you're free, can we continue talking over a glass or two?" She grinned, exposing her delicate fangs, "or a bottle or two, I should say?"

Jaina hesitated, then shrugged off her worry. This was Vereesa. Even after the horrors of Theramore where Jaina's choices had doomed Rhonin to a pointless death, the elven woman had never stopped extending companionship. Their lapse in communication was on Jaina's shoulders, not Vereesa's. She cracked a sheepish smile and gestured for the ranger to follow her back towards where she'd observed the city.

While the inn relatively ignored Jaina, Vereesa's passage through the ground floor was met with interest, of both the good and ill sort. The few Quel'dorei in the room offered the elven ranger a fair greeting, and Vereesa smiled at them in return, but the human patrons - and the oddly numerous Ren'dorei stared at Vereesa with something akin to suspicion. Jaina waited until they were upstairs and behind the warded door before she broached the subject.

Vereesa's laugh was a brittle bark. "You noticed, did you?"

Jaina winced, but the other woman waved off her apology before she could begin to form it.

"It's … complicated, Jaina, and trivial, really."

"It doesn't seem trivial."

Vereesa's ears pinned low, and she crossed the room towards the balcony and the open bottle. "How much do you know about the Ren'dorei?"

"Very little, I'm afraid." Jaina followed her friend outside. She leaned against the railing, turned to watch Vereesa pour them both a glass. "Just that they're a sect of elves that are entwined with the Void, somehow."

"You make it sound so harmless," Vereesa's nose crinkled as she took a drink. "Like they're on an afternoon's dalliance."

"I do hail from an island nation where our strongest magic users have been quietly listening to the void for a while now, apparently," Jaina responded. "I suppose the whole affair is a little flippant for me."

Vereesa gave her a look. "Magic affects elves differently than humans." Her voice took on a droning air like she was giving a lesson to a fresh-faced squire, and not Jaina. "Your … Tidesages … might listen to the Void, but they don't … how do I explain this? They don't absorb it - become one with it. Give an elf a strong enough influx of a magical source, and they'll adapt to it …" she trailed off, her expression morphing from a droll explanation, to confusion, to sheepish apology when she finally noticed the look Jaina fixed her with.

"Really?" Jaina drawled, tucking a hand underneath her chin. "That sounds _utterly_ fascinating and I have never once seen it in action. Tell me more about this strange, mysterious ability -"

"Shut up, Proudmoore." Vereesa stuck her tongue out but took the ribbing gracefully.

"No no, please, go on!" Jaina waved her free hand for Vereesa to continue. "It's not like I'm an archmage or anything, with far too much research about the theories of magic under my belt."

Vereesa's ears pinned back, but her grin was playful and her eyes twinkled with amusement. She'd also gone stock still, and Jaina's suspicions grew when Vereesa's expression shifted to completely transparent innocence. It was like watching a cat decide when it wanted to pounce. Jaina waited and waited, and when she figured that whatever Vereesa's look implied wasn't going to come to pass, she yelped as her propped arm was swiped out from beneath her.

Vereesa cackled merrily as Jaina struggled to regain her balance without looking like a fool.

When Jaina was upright and her dignity was somewhat restored, Vereesa offered her a refilled glass.

"So, that means you'd understand if I mentioned the current state of Silvermoon and the _lovely_ debate on if the Sin'dorei need to be recategorized yet again. Last I checked, it's a strong tie between ' _Alar'dorei'_ and ' _Belore'dorei._ '" Vereesa waited for a beat, took a long gulp of the wine. "I personally support the 'Enough'dorei.'"

Jaina didn't know how to answer that, so she waited. She didn't have to wait long.

Vereesa sighed, "of course if it's not an argument about what to call Light-Elves, there's always the Void. Alleria's gone for years, left Quel'thalas when -" she cut herself off, flashed Jaina a bitter smile, and drained the rest of the cup in one swig. "Give it another ten years Jaina, and the Quel'dorei will live only in depressing stories and war memorials."

"That's -"

"We've been friends for a while, Jaina, so I know you're smarter than whatever you were about to say." Vereesa fixed her with a look, then poured herself a second glass. She fixed a happy smile on her face, then changed the subject. "Sorry, the ren'dorei are a touchy subject. I tend to forget the little manners I've learned when they come up."

Jaina took the offered out gratefully. "You learned manners when I was away? I'm impressed, Vereesa."

Vereesa's laugh was far more light-hearted this time. "Let's start over, shall we? Hello Jaina, I'm incredibly happy to see you again. The boys and I missed you terribly."

"I missed you, and your boys. They're - goodness, they're teenagers now?"

"They're troll-spawn is what they are," Vereesa muttered, though her voice was fond. "They've hit that age where I embarrass them just by breathing in the same room."

Jaina smiled. "They love you dearly, I'm sure."

"Oh, I know. I was the same way at their age, so I hope they age along the human axis through this part of their lives all the same."

"Not interested in going through what your mother did?"

" _Belore_ , no! I was an absolute brat!" Vereesa stared at her, aghast at even the implication of what Jaina suggested. "One, I had two older sisters who essentially took all the burden of responsibility off of me," she ticked off on her fingers, "two, I had a little brother who was the perfect partner in crime, and finally an entire forest to run havoc through. Any aging my mother did was caused by her children. She fought on the front lines to get a break."

"Vereesa!"

"I wish I was exaggerating." Vereesa grinned. She flopped gracefully into one of the chairs and stared pointedly at Jaina until she followed suit. Jaina did, and the conversation flowed between them as if the years apart had never happened.

They stayed away from the heavier topics: things like Theramore, new family matters (especially concerning certain sisters), and the political state of the elven people. Instead, they discussed arcane theory and the archeological research that Vereesa had found an interest in a year or so back. While relations were still tense, Vereesa did split her time between Dalaran and expeditions into the untouched sections of Silvermoon where the elven city gave way to a troll temple-city complex that seemed built on an even earlier foundation. Some of it was Titan-inspired, but the rest was from an unknown era.

Vereesa off-handedly mentioned that she'd opened up channels of communication with the Farseer of Azeroth - a Darkspear shaman. The woman had more knowledge about the elemental planes and the bizarre history of their kingdoms that perhaps there could be answers found there.

As the afternoon faded into a gentle evening, and then to a star-studded night, the first bottle was replaced by another, and by the time that the first patrons of the inn made their way out onto the street to return to their homes, Jaina felt lighter than she'd been in years. Her reflexes were shot, and she was pretty confident that her current defense of the summoning of a water elemental by a frost mage versus the summoning of elementals by shamans was mostly on-the-spot speculation fueled by a hefty dose of alcohol.

Vereesa's out of her chair and half-balanced on the railing when Jaina finally registered the commotion down below. She leaned up carefully to see what had snagged the ranger's attention.

A crowd had formed a loose circle around a prone, convulsing figure. It was hard to make out who it was due to the shadows of the Lounge, but the strange pallor of the skin, the dark, twisted tendrils of the void that cracked through the cobblestone, and the gibbered Thalassian told Jaina that she was watching one of the ren'dorei fall apart.

Just like the Alliance feared.

Was this the first time? Or had there been similar collapses over the years? She turned her head to ask Vereesa, but the ranger was entirely upon the railing now, and her bow unslung from her shoulders. She lifted it up, an arrow already nocked upon the string as she pulled it back to her cheek. "Jaina," she said, her voice surprisingly steady despite the wine they'd consumed all evening. "Manage the crowd."

"Manage the - Vereesa, what are you talking about?"

The arrow's let loose. It flew over the heads of those in the crowd, towards two encroaching Lightforged Draenei. The two blazed as bright as lighthouses, their brands gleaming against their alabaster skin. They had weapons unsheathed, and were utterly focused on reaching their target. So the sudden bind at their hooves threw them even more off-guard. The right one, a male Draenei with a broken horn, stumbled to his knees as the magical webbing threw off his balance. He snarled as he hit the cobblestone, looking around for the unexpected attack. He found it when Vereesa let loose another warning shot. Her arrows were blunt-tipped, meant for concussive force and deterrence than true harm. Jaina's been on the opposite side of a ranger wielding them - she knew the bruises they left well.

"Jaina - please!"

Jaina's attention snapped back to the crowd. They were closing in upon the unarmed ren'dorei. Some had taken the Lightforges' approach as their own, and weapons were being pulled out. Magic crackled along staves, and the creak of another bow-string eased into the night.

She blinked down, and as she felt her feet connect with the solid stone, let out a wave of frost that locked the crowd in place. Arrows whistled overhead. There was a whisper of magic, and Jaina noticed the ice weaken about the knees of a paladin. She lifted her gaze to meet his own.

Human. Like her. He had the burnished skin of someone born in Stormwind, or perhaps Stranglethorn. He bore the medals of someone who fought the Legion, fought in Northrend. She vaguely recalled him standing in the crowd honored as the vanguard into Icecrown.

Now, again, he stood opposite of her. Only this time, she stood between him and his duty. She whispered an apology, then flicked a ribbon of magic toward him. She had wine in her system, and it slowed her down. But he'd been drinking too, and he had to swing his weapon to reach her actively.

She just needed to will her intent into being.

His hammer clattered to the ground as a sheep studied her from where the paladin stood.

Above her, Vereesa was shouting. "Fetch Alleria - now!" Who -

A ren'dorei further out from the mess, turned on her heel and opened a void rift. She disappeared within an instant.

"Stay back! My next arrows won't be blunt!"

The Lightforged were close enough now that the glow from their brands broke through the throng like streaks of sunlight through clouds. Even at a distance, the Draenei were tall enough to be observed over the heads of the people between them. The one with the broken horn scowled at Vereesa as she loosed another arrow his way.

"They have succumbed to the Void! It is a light-given mercy to put them down before the madness infects others -"

"You don't get to make that call," Vereesa growled. She pulled the string back against her cheek once again and waited. True to her threat, Jaina could see the razor-edge of the nocked arrow. It would penetrate through plate mail without trouble.

The other Lightforged tried for the less-aggressive tactic. Like his counterpart, his brands flared with the Light, but he held out his hands placatingly. "Lady Windrunner, it is not a duty we take lightly -"

"I'm pretty damned certain it is not your duty at all to be judge and executioner of a citizen in the street." Vereesa's voice shook with emotion. "Especially an elf. You do not get to choose how my people die."

"Be reasonable, woman!" Broken-Horn snapped, and surged forward, ignoring his companion's hand upon his shoulder. He strode to the edge of the frozen crowd and pointed his axe toward the ren'dorei behind Jaina. "We let this one live, and we will have Voidspawn in the streets! One death versus many more - ARGH!"

Scarlet blossomed in the space between his shoulder pauldron and his breastplate, vivid and bright against the crisp white-gold of his armor. Vereesa already had another arrow ready and glowered down. "Stay. Back."

Broken Horn didn't stay back. He snarled, ripping the arrow from his shoulder to toss it down onto the street. Blood dripped along his arm, and he lifted his axe up to point it toward Vereesa. "It is too late - the void's madness has touched her as well! First, the abomination - then you."

Broken-Horn met Jaina's gaze, and she felt chilled by what she saw within them. There was only zealotry. He cracked his neck and offered her a grim 'move'.

Move?

Broken-Horn roared and charged forward. The ice shattered as his momentum threw people from their feet, knocked others to the ground as he shouldered past them quicker than she expected from him.

More arrows peppered into him, now to hold him off of Jaina and the trembling ren'dorei, but warriors had a way of ignoring pain.

All Jaina could see was the keen edge of the axe catching the light, and the rush of air as the massive weapon swung high in an arc meant to end somewhere behind her - or in her if she didn't - there wasn't time to think. She had a second, maybe two to decide her fate. She readied the blink spell, desperate to avoid being cleaved in two.

Time warped and slowed around her.

Sounds became distant. She heard Vereesa shout something indistinguishable, her voice cracking with emotion; she heard the crowd gasp and screams of terror pierce the night. She heard the sibilant whisper of slithering voices from fissures that were splitting through the ren'dorei's arms, chest, neck.

He was going to die, and something _else_ was going to live.

"I'm an idiot." Jaina turned her back on the oncoming axe. She flung herself at the ren'dorei, stumbled and scraped her knees on the cobblestone as she awkwardly gathered him to her.

A white-hot flash of pain ripped through her shoulder as ice flurries exploded into existence around her and her newfound charge. She tasted copper on her tongue and felt cold emptiness steal into her bones as her hands closed around the ren'dorei. She looked down out of instinct and found herself staring into an abyss that was opening up underneath split flesh.

She wasn't Khadgar or one of the Nightborne - she couldn't manage time the way she needed to right now!

So she did the next best thing.

She teleported them to the only place in Dalaran that could stop time.

The world wrenched around her, and this close to the Void, it disorientated her. The last thing she saw before blackness overtook her was the shimmering bars of the stasis-cell.

And all she could think was: _good._


	2. Chapter 2

" - possible to separate them now - "

Voices came into her awareness through a thick fog of unconsciousness. There were three she could make out, then those three turned into a cacophony that drowned her thoughts, only for silence to sweep back into control.

"She didn't have another choice!" That was Vereesa, voice high-pitched and emotional.

"She could have allowed the Lightforged their duty," that was an unfamiliar male voice, though she'd sworn she'd heard the speaker somewhere before. "The elf had become a nexus."

"Alleria - you of all people should understand why I did not allow two random passersbys attempt murder of one of our own."

"Our own?" Alleria's voice was honeyed smoke. "Last time we had this conversation, you were accusing me of stealing them from you, but she's right, Turalyon; we cannot allow the precedent of the Lightforged striking down folk in the street -"

"Thank you -"

"Even if this situation potentially warranted it." Alleria pressed on despite Vereesa's interruptions.

Jaina looked down to the ren'dorei still in her arms, only to find that she couldn't move. Her muscles refused to obey even the simplest of requests. The stimulus had nowhere to go, fizzling out somewhere between her intent and the action. She had her mind, though, and her thoughts raced along the conversation on the opposite side of the stasis-barrier.

She couldn't make out more than light and shapes. A beacon of light stood in the direct center, close enough to the barrier that she could trace out the massive shoulder pauldrons and the hilt of a massive two-handed sword. Turalyon, she assumed. Behind him, slightly to the left, a tall figure clad in emerald and gold stood distant to the barrier itself. Then, another figure further away still, in the soft blue and silver that Vereesa favored so well.

When they stopped talking, that was when Jaina heard the other voices. It immediately made her think of Thros - of those agonizing months in the Blighted Lands listening to all of her doubts, hatreds, and fears manifested, but these weren't the hissing hatreds of bitter souls.

These whispers came soft, scratching at her ear like a many-legged thing that wanted to come inside from the cold. They spoke of a thousand different offers; obscure knowledge, power, and the ability to walk the endless cold. Jaina was grateful she couldn't move because she feared that if she looked down into that split-flesh so close to her own that there'd be an imploring, hungry gaze that she wouldn't be able to resist.

Then, there's a shriek. A chorus of pain rose up in her ear before the voices went, mercifully, silent.

Alleria sighed. "Well, we have an answer on Jaina's status - she's alive, and conscious enough that the Void whispers to her. Which means they're not completely fused."

 _Completely what, now?_

"Fused?" Vereesa echoed Jaina's thoughts.

"Mm. Lieutenant Sinclair was it not?"

"Aye, ma'am?" Lieutenant Sinclair was the mage in charge of the Violet Hold. She'd led the troops in the face of two breaches into the prison, and was one of the few people still alive that knew that more than a couple of the cells within the Hold held prisoners of the Sunreaver Purge. Officially, all of the prisoners had been released when Khadgar had retaken control of the Kirin Tor back for himself. Unofficially -

"Reestablish the sedation protocols in the cell holding Lady Proudmoore - I think we might have a chance to … extract her from the situation without any lasting side-effects, and that reduces the opportunity for whatever is trying to step through to try and strike a deal with her." Alleria ordered, and the emerald and gold figure stepped down and towards Jaina's prison.

"I don't think Lady Proudmoore -"

Like before, Alleria pressed on despite the interruption. "Lady Proudmoore is currently locked in a cell with the potential awakening of a rather nasty creature from the void just centimeters away from her own body. I think you'll find, Lieutenant, that the Lady Proudmoore might find this to be her best option."

" ...yes, Lady Windrunner."

She heard the hum of the arcane channels. Blackness swallowed her once more.

Pain brought her back.

There were more figures on the other side of the barrier, she counted six or seven. They were animated, ducking and weaving around each other.

Something was moving in the cell with her too, or instead, the whisper of movement kept brushing against her ears. It was impossible for anything to move in the cells, but the sensation that something was scuttling right along the nape of her neck would not go away.

Jaina wanted to call out to the people on the outside to hurry up, or fix this, or put her back under because the implication of what was attempting to breach through into the world right underneath her chin was starting to terrify her beyond rational thought.

One of the shapes moved in front of the barrier. They weren't familiar, neither were the colors they wore. "Lady Proudmoore, we're almost ready for the extraction. We're just doubling down on a few precautionary measures." The voice was male, gruff but unknown to her.

Jaina waited. What else could she do?

Alleria stepped into hazy view. She had taken on the void guise, her shape now a swarming coil of purple and black. "Lady Proudmoore, I trust you're more than eager to finish this. I'll be bringing you through the barrier itself while Sinclair activates it."

 _What._

Alleria pressed on. "It will be painful, and the beast that's in there with you will do everything possible to prevent you from stepping forward, but if you resist - there's a strong possibility that you die in there."

" _Belore_ , Alleria, you don't need to be so blunt," Vereesa muttered.

"Don't I?" Alleria's gaze shifted from her sister back to Jaina. "When I reach you, you will hear … things. Do not listen. Go back to the training of an apprentice and clear your mind of all thoughts. Don't open your eyes, just follow me. When you feel my hands, walk."

How could she walk? The stasis barrier would send her directly back into oblivion? This sounded less like a plan, and more like an elaborate way to wind up dead - or ripped into pieces.

The barrier shimmered purple-black. The void sliced through the arcane wall and opened into an abyss that had a hundred-thousand twinkling stars in its depth. It was beautiful, and drained away the colors of the magical barrier around it. The void ate at the arcane until the gap was large enough for someone to step through.

Alleria Windrunner appeared in stunning clarity, a vision of purple, black, and a bone-white so stark that it reflected the colors within and around her. She was tall and muscular for the typical elf, and moved with a sinuous, predatory grace.

Despite the stasis-spell, Alleria easily reached forward and grasped at Jaina's arms, the void shimmering along her skin. Her hold hurt; like Jaina spent too long without actual contact. With careful motions, Alleria unfurled Jaina's arms from the ren'dorei, and then spent longer unwrapping something long and whip-like from around Jaina's own form. When Alleria pulled, Jaina felt her body following, but then -

 _ **KILLHERKILLHERTAKETHEPOWER!**_

That wasn't a whisper. It was a screech that pierced Jaina's eardrum and left her gasping. When she inhaled, her lungs squeezed down and refused to expand. A band cinched tight at her ribs. She gasped again, more from the pain, and lost another inch of air.

This close, the void poured from Alleria and left her touch ice-cold as she guided Jaina forward. Jaina struggled to remember the instructions: keep her mind blank, keep her focus ahead.

Another vice-grip, this time around her thigh. It bit down until Jaina couldn't feel her leg beneath it. Had it torn through -

"Don't look back," Alleria warned.

They passed through the actual barrier, the void gliding over her while the barrier struggled to keep everything still. The static raked along Jaina's skin, scoured her flesh like she'd been caught in a Tanaris sandstorm. She lost the last of her breath.

Air, crisp and fresh caressed her face. She could make out details now, her gaze could dart anywhere she willed herself to look. Alleria repeated her warning just as Jaina's attention skirted off to the left, at a strange coiling movement just outside her field of vision.

She had the feeling of staring into some vast empty space. Alleria tugged her attention back, and she felt cold and bereft.

"Jaina!"

Vereesa lurched forward and stopped only a foot or so away. Vereesa idled from foot to foot as another elf, this one from Silvermoon judging from the golden eyes that peered over her, approached from the upper level of the Hold. Two human priests followed, each held their battle-staff loosely in their grip, but the implication wasn't lost on Jaina. They would have wielded their magics and their weapons without thought if the extraction had gone wrong. They were also not among the living.

The first was a man she knew from reputation more than personal encounters. There had been a time when Jaina was younger that the name Alonsus Faol was known to nearly every subject within the northern kingdoms of Lordaeron, Gilneas, and Kul Tiras. The champion of the light and the mastermind behind the Order of the Silver Hand, Alonsus Faol had brought Lordaeron's legacy of knighthood to new heights, and it had been his vision that the Order had followed. When she'd learned of his death at the Scourge years later, it was as if a piece of Lordaeron's past itself died that day.

To see him now, though, meant to endure the slow mummification of the Forsaken condition. Jaina remembered one of his sermons, recalled how he had stood proudly upon the podium as he preached unity and dedication to the ideals of the Arathi Alliance. He hunched now, because his spine was unable to support his broad stature. His hair was straw, stuck to the dry, frayed edges of his face. His skin was taut, pulled along his muscles and bone like a scarecrow in the fields. His eyes were the same, she thought, a powerful gaze that seemed to stare straight through her.

"Lady Proudmoore," he rasped and bowed low. She returned the bow with a shaky incline of her head.

"Hello, Jaina."

Jaina turned to the second undead. She was no forsaken, brought back by the necromantic arts. At first glance, the woman still looked alive - though paler than perhaps would be healthy. A second glance revealed the subtle clues that gave her condition away. She didn't breathe, and she was so still.

Nothing like the girl Jaina had spent days in the countryside with.

No, Calia Menethil was a whirlwind of energy and youthful zeal in Jaina's memories. This woman was a statue charmed to move with eyes that were blank pools of gold, a direct mirror into the Light that infused her very core. Calia Menethil was no more than a marionette that moved only at the mercy of a will far stronger than her own.

Jaina supposed that was unkind, but she'd never forgiven her old friend for the decades of silence - for letting her think Calia had died, for leaving Jaina to fend through the aftermath of the third war alone.

"Queen Menethil," she said with a neutrality she didn't quite feel. Jaina fell back on years of diplomatic training and time spent in war rooms surrounded by enemies eager for the smallest window of opportunity. "I didn't realize this was supposed to be a viewing?"

Archbishop Faol chuckled. "While I'm glad for your safe extraction, High Priestess Menethil and I are here to oversee the nullification of the creature you managed to trap in the cell - clever thinking, that."

Alleria released her once the eldest Windrunner was finished with her own check-over of the mage, and sidestepped Jaina to approach the cell again when Jaina called her name. "Yes?"

"The - the elf I teleported," Jaina didn't turn to face Alleria. She looked straight ahead and used one of the torches as a focal point to steady her vision. "What's going to happen to him?"

"A quick death if fate's merciful," Alleria responded.

"Death?"

Alleria hummed, noncommittal. "You did the right thing, teleporting him. If he'd remained on the streets, we would have had some unwanted guests to take care of."

Jaina tried to exchange a glance with Vereesa, but the youngest Windrunner stared at her sister with an unreadable expression. Her ears constantly fidgeted, giving Jaina an insight into Vereesa's mind - but without a translation guide.

"I couldn't let him be put down like a dog in the street," Vereesa managed, finally. She sounded, well, Jaina wasn't sure how to categorize it, but heartbroken felt close enough. The youngest Windrunner watched Alleria head back to the barrier before she looked and gave Jaina a wan smile that didn't reach her eyes.

Jaina stared back, unsure of how to proceed. She reached out and squeezed Vereesa's hands in her own. After a second, Vereesa returned the gesture.

Archbishop Faol and Queen Menethil both met Alleria at the barrier and were joined by Turalyon and the Lieutenant. The only occupant beside Vereesa that hadn't gone to join them was the sin'dorei priestess.

Fair of feature, and timeless like all the elves, the priestess had soft copper hair and a lean cast to her facial expression that came off a bit too sharp with the torchlight. The shadows grew long over her, and though her eyes gleamed with the Sunwell's holy energy, Jaina swore she could see something darker swim through that gaze.

Vereesa made the introductions. The priestess was Merridath Swiftarrow - the champion that had managed to contain a dangerous artifact of the void. Sure enough, at the elven woman's hip was a pale sickle-shaped dagger. It held a central gem cut in the appearance of an eye, and as Jaina looked at it, she felt a cunning, cold intellect staring back.

Swiftarrow shifted, breaking the contact with an apologetic smile. "I'm fairly certain you're all right, but I'd like to bring you somewhere a bit more conductive towards healing and observation if you wouldn't mind?"

Jaina glanced to Vereesa, who gave her a tight-lipped smile that gave away nothing.

Behind her, she heard the hum of the arcane wards come to life.

"Lead the way."

Swiftarrow led them out from the Violet Hold. A crowd had gathered around the entrance, bodies packed tightly along the bridge for the chance at peeking into whatever had sent the prison into lockdown for the third time.

As they passed the initial throng, the open space at the back hosted several bands of adventurers checking over gear and preparing various tinctures that tickled the senses. Someone must have leaked information - Jaina just hoped that Alleria's assertion that they could handle the breach without outside assistance kept true.

Their journey wasn't too far after leaving the Prison district. There was a nearby flower and herb shop, with an older gnomish woman as the proprietor. The place smelled of dried herbs, magethorn and fadeleaf were predominant among the scents. The small shopkeeper grinned up at the three of them.

"Lady Swiftarrow, that bouquet for your daughter is almost finished, but I've got like," she tapped out on her fingers, "four questions to ask … you …" the gnome woman trailed off, voice fading as she noticed who Swiftarrow had brought with her, and the way Jaina swayed on her feet.

The shopkeeper launched into a flurry of action, hopping down from her stool and ushering them into the room itself. She flipped the sign to 'closed' and waved them into a back parlor. That done, she disappeared through the door again, and Jaina heard the clinking of cups.

Vereesa's glance around the room was polite, but her focus ultimately returned to Jaina. She sat down on a pile of cushions opposite a day couch and looked very much like a tense, coiled cat as she oversaw the priestess guide Jaina to sit on the couch next to her.

Swiftarrow reached and undid the clasp that held her dagger to her belt, and as that eye was exposed again, that cold, distant intellect returned to Jaina's awareness. It studied her just as she noticed and studied it in return.

Swiftarrow frowned, and tucked the dagger upon a nearby table, out of view. "Is she speaking to you?"

"She?" Jaina blinked, her attention moving towards the priestess.

Swiftarrow pointed toward the dagger. She didn't look convinced as Jaina shook her head. "Xal'atath. If she whispers, try your best not to listen."

Xal'atath. The name clattered in her skull like a rattlesnake's tail.

"Like the whispers that the ren'dorei deal with?" Jaina inquired. Swiftarrow considered a moment before she answered.

"In a roundabout way. I have one agent of the Void trying to corrupt me. She whispers, beguiles, and makes lovely promises. The ren'dorei battle hundreds at once, and have to manage being halfway corrupted as it stands."

Jaina thought back to that horrible, gaping maw of nothingness that she spied in the flesh of the writhing elf. "How do you control it?"

"Control is such a curious word. How exactly does one control chaos?" Swiftarrow arched a brow and brought up a hand to cup over Jaina's forehead. "Now, if you allow it, I am going to see through your mind - skirt along the surface so to speak, and see if you've kept any lingering effects from the time in stasis."

Jaina balked. While she understood that a visit to a priest after such an encounter would be the best course of action, having a priest scour through her mind - and an ex-member of the Horde.

Not just the Horde, but one of the Sin'dorei themselves. She might have had friends within the Sunreavers, and the last thing Jaina wanted were those memories to be dragged into the light.

Swiftarrow's hand hovered there, her lips curved into a bemused smile as she waited out Jaina's hesitation. "If you feel the need to confess, Lady Proudmoore, I'm afraid you'll need to find another priest. I have enough of my own burdens to be concerned with whatever ghosts are buried in your past."

That … wasn't reassuring at all.

Vereesa broke the stalemate, "Jaina?"

Jaina looked her way, then back to the Priestess. "Is this the only way?"

"Perhaps if I explained exactly what I'm going to do?" Swiftarrow lifted her hand slightly. "I've heard that you're one of the few humans actually interested in the theory behind the magic."

Jaina considered, then shook her head. "No, I'm just - no," she coughed. "Please, go ahead."

Swiftarrow waited for a beat longer, then nodded. She curled her right hand around the pale, sickle-dagger, and her left hand fell directly upon Jaina's skin.

The assault was immediate.

The priestess was an inferno. A scouring blaze that seared away shadows. Somewhere distant, there's another voice - a seductive, feminine voice that mocked and crooned words that slip through Jaina's comprehension.

She responded to it.

No.

A strange, hollowed-out portion of her responded to it. A part of her that feels intimately like what-if and regret and desire. The part of her that still wondered if her choices were the right ones, or that still longed to fix and adjust and change the world around her.

That blaze skimmed the surface of Stratholme, and Jaina plucked painfully at the temptations that still clung to that day in her mind. The blaze continued, touching on the purge of the Sunreavers, over the way the overwhelming power of the Iris held the entirety of Bladefist Bay's water at her fingertips. Over other, more private memories and wants. Vereesa's face flitted to the surface, her eyes bright with affection before the image faded.

And the priestess withdrew.

Swiftarrow's brow was drenched in sweat, and Jaina was surprised to find hers was as well. She touched a shaking finger to her forehead. She was warm.

"Well," Swiftarrow busied herself with reattaching the blade back to its place upon her hip. "You'll have some interesting dreams for a while, and I daresay a few nightmares, but your thoughts are still your own."

Jaina flicked a quick, secretive glance to Vereesa, then back to Swiftarrow. "So, I'm not going to turn out like …"

"Kivan?" Swiftarrow clipped the dagger with practiced ease. "No. You might be a little more aware of what the void's capable of, but you're still you. No threat of becoming an abomination and destroying all that you love."

Jaina blinked. Vereesa sucked in a painful breath that sounded like a hiss.

Swiftarrow shrugged with all the nonchalance of someone who's taught themselves the art of indifference to survive. Jaina understood that well enough. Sometimes to survive, you needed to cut away the softness - and sometimes, being nice got people killed.

Vereesa slumped back on the cushions, despondent and frustrated. She worried her hands, her knuckles white as she worked her hands again and again. "What we saw outside the Lounge - that will happen to all Ren'dorei?"

Swiftarrow opened her mouth, paused, then nodded. "That's the running theory. Eventually, the corruption will win. It's a matter of 'when' for them."

"Even Alleria?"

Swiftarrow shrugged one shoulder. "It's her theory."

Vereesa scowled. "She never mentioned it to me."

"I need to protect my baby sister somehow," Alleria spoke up from the entrance to the room, followed by the gnomish shopkeeper who carried a tea-tray.

Vereesa's scowl didn't leave as her sister entered, but she tracked Alleria's movement without blinking. "So what happened?"

"What needed to be done."

Vereesa's ears twitched, her eyes narrowed, and she was certainly not amused by Alleria's flippancy. Alleria, for her part, slumped with a sheepish apology and halted her approach. The indomitable aura about her faded under the glower from her youngest sister.

Alleria smiled politely. "I'm glad you're all right, Lady Proudmoore."

"Thank you for rescuing me."

Alleria's ears twitched down, and the smile she gave was a little more genuine. "Don't mention it." She glanced back to Vereesa, and looked like she wanted to speak more.

"Vereesa, I'd like to talk with Priestess Swiftarrow?"

Vereesa blinked, but caught onto Jaina's idea. "Of course." She stood up, brushing her leggings off. She seemed to have her own course of action in mind, because when she spoke next, her voice brooked no argument. "Come on, Alleria. I demand something stronger than tea for what you're about to tell me."

Alleria was pulled off-balance as Vereesa clamped a hand around her sister's forearm. "What am I about to tell you - and didn't you already work through a bottle of wine - gaah!" She stumbled to keep upright as Vereesa continued pulling her. "Uh, have a good evening, Lady Proudmoore?"

Jaina watched the sisters leave quietly and thanked the shopkeeper when she set a cup of steaming tea before her. She prided herself on keeping her hand from shaking too much as she picked up the cup to bring it to her lips. "Now, Priestess… what is the theory behind your mind-scour?"

Swiftarrow, who'd been a quiet observer since Alleria had entered, turned to Jaina with a curious tilt of her head, and launched into the beginning of magical theory. If Jaina's luck held out, she'd end the night on a progressive note.


	3. Chapter 3

The first four nights after the incident, Jaina couldn't shake off the sensation that she'd missed a vital clue somewhere. A clue to what, she wasn't sure of, but every morning found her waking up drenched in the cold, clammy sweat of night terrors and her focus during the daily meetings was trained more on trying to suss out what kept her anxiety ramped up than the actual events.

Jaina had kept up contact with Swiftarrow, having found the priestess just as eager to delve into long hours debating theory and the implication of magic in the lives of the average Azerothian as she herself was. When Jaina mentioned the dread on the third day, Swiftarrow suggested a small tincture of peacebloom-infused tea to lull Jaina to sleep, and then fadeleaf and dreamfoil to keep that sleep dreamless.

By the end of the first week, Jaina chalked the entire bout of restlessness to the aftermath of being locked in a cell with a void creature and renewed her investment in the diplomatic proceedings.

Not that the diplomatic proceedings were ultimately healthier for her mindset. What had begun as an honest attempt to restore the hierarchy and heritage of three ancient kingdoms had turned into a series of petty squabbles as the histories and entitlement of nobility and royalty clashed together in only the ways the social elite could manage.

The borderlands of Gilneas had been rendered almost entirely useless for large-scale agriculture thanks to the upheaval of the Cataclysm which hadn't overly affected the Gilneans too much due to the way the curse of the worgen now spread through their blood and their lineages. The old farms and estates had gone fallow and overrun with wild game which was a boon to the worgen. However, with the capital city still blighted, the idea had been to move north into Silverpine to rebuild the communities of Pyrewood and Ambermill.

Directly countering the needs of the few living Lordaeron who did not want to subject themselves to Greymane's rule. The Gileans might have become one of the integral pieces of the High Alliance, but the survivors of the plague had not so easily forgotten (or forgiven) the isolation and abandonment by their southern neighbor.

That didn't even touch the prospect of the Lightsworn, made of both the undead risen by the naaru, and those forsaken who had committed to (and survived) the Ordeal by Holy Fire - a secretive rite that the Lightforged offered to those damned into undeath.

Jaina was there mostly to serve as a neutral party, due to Kul Tiras remaining relatively self-sufficient even after the Zandalari Wars; she remembered the days in Theramore where the political environment made her long for the solitude of academic study.

As the first week wore out, Jaina noticed Alleria's growing presence as a sideline to the proceedings. Officially, it was Magister Umbric who represented the ren'dorei, but Alleria was one of the old heroes and Jaina believed it must have felt natural for Silvermoon to look to one of the Windrunners for guidance.

Vereesa had been present for the first week as well, but had disappeared by the time of the Arathi treaties. The youngest Windrunner often did not have the temperament for human politics, and Jaina first thought nothing of it as Vereesa seemed glad to leave the negotiations to the humans.

It was around the end of the second week that Jaina started to consider that the initial feeling of dread should not have been - as she'd first done - brushed off as the aftermath of trauma, but as an early warning.

After a grueling session that laid out the recent amendments to the land rights along the southern foothills of the Hinterlands, Alleria caught up with Jaina as the mage started down the stairs to the street outside the Citadel. The elven ranger stood out even among the eclectic, showmanship attire of the various adventurers, dressed in a simple loose-fitting tunic and bay-colored leggings. The emerald and gold that Jaina associated with the eldest Windrunner was evident in the cloak that Alleria wore to acknowledge the chill of the encroaching autumn.

"Lady Proudmoore," Alleria greeted. "I trust I didn't snore so loud this time around in the meeting?"

Jaina blinked but took the unexpected conversation in stride. She broke pace just for a second, then continued down the stairs. "No louder than myself, I'm afraid. I understand that we're making true progress here in healing the war-wounds, but the posturing is so aggravating."

Alleria laughed, "not a fan of politics?"

"On the contrary, I find politics fascinating. I strongly support the idea of mutual cooperation between nations to ensure a stronger, healthier world for all. It's the ego that I detest."

"I was certain that to engage in politics, one needed the ego." Alleria guided them off the main thoroughfare toward one of the slender alleyways behind the shops themselves. The identity of the crowd around them shifted away from the numerous Draenei, humans, and Lightforged and toward a mixture of races that reminded Jaina of the Dalaran that hovered over Northrend.

Ren'dorei lounged on steps, engaged in games of chance with gnomes and the occasional goblin. Dark Iron Dwarves were here as well, a large group gathered around a makeshift anvil. They argued in Dwarvish, gesturing wildly over two air elementals who looked content to feed on the thermals rising up from the nearby brazier.

Jaina took in the new surroundings but didn't break the conversation flow to inquire to the detour. "I take it you didn't approve of the division of the southern Hillsbrad Foothills?" She inquired innocently, knowing full well that Alleria had mentally tuned out by that portion of the meeting.

Alleria flashed her a wicked smile."I leave such intellectual strain to the men. They don't get to beat their chests anymore, and I can't deny them their fun when it shows up."

Jaina chuckled.

The two of them stopped in front of a Hearthstone tournament, and as the players were picking out their decks, Jaina felt the pressure of a dampening spell rise up around them. The murmur of the crowd grew in intensity, and for anyone outside the small radius of quiet, they'd struggle to hear anything beyond the raucous cheering of the audience. Alleria was no mage, so Jaina searched for the spell's origin.

She found it in the ren'dorei challenger currently flipping through some of the high-mana cards in her deck. The void elf looked up upon being observed and met Jaina's gaze with a barely perceivable nod before she returned to her preparations.

"Concerned about Southshore trade secrets, Lady Windrunner?" Jaina kept her question light; if the elven ranger was going through this much trouble to speak with her relatively privately, she'd at least play along.

Alleria made a face at the title. "Lady Windrunner is my mother, please, just call me Alleria."

Yeah, that wasn't going to happen. Alleria might have been Vereesa's sister, but she was also one of the heroes of the old Alliance. Her sacrifice upon Draenor was the basis for countless stories of glory and honor that Jaina had grown up on, and it would be impossible to just set aside that sort of awe.

"Lady Alleria, then?"

Alleria didn't appear thrilled with the amendment but shrugged. "That works."

Jaina nodded and proceeded to watch the first round of cards. She'd never got into Hearthstone itself, but many of the apprentices she'd grown up with had loved the game - betting curfews, allowances, and spell-aids on the outcome.

Several minutes passed, and they exchanged small-talk about the game before Alleria guided them onward. The elf kept glancing surreptitiously over her shoulder as they maneuvered through the crowd, but when Jaina tried to follow where she looked, she saw nothing out of the ordinary.

Somewhere between the back-entrance to the herb gardens and the Reliquary, Alleria brought up the actual reason she'd tagged along on Jaina's impromptu nightly walk.

"Vereesa hasn't been to the last five councils," Alleria announced.

Jaina thought back but brushed it off. "Vereesa doesn't enjoy them."

"She used to. Vereesa constantly tagged along when Syl - " the name caught in her throat, and Alleria coughed, "- when Sylvanas observed military meetings under our mother's supervision."

Times like this, Jaina wondered the actual age difference between the Windrunner sisters, but there's never been a decent time to ask Vereesa about her sisters before, and now wasn't any better. Jaina's fingers itched for a glass to hold, just to have something to fiddle with.

"She left the councils to Rhonin," Jaina added in.

Alleria's ears dipped low, "they probably reminded her of - well -" she put on a more pleasant smile that didn't reach her eyes. "That explains her absence, then, though could you ask her to come find me?"

Jaina nodded, about to answer 'of course' when she balked. Now that she thought about it, she hadn't seen Vereesa for the past week. "I … actually haven't seen her recently. She might have taken the twins out of the city for a while?"

"That would be like her, but the twins are still in the apprentice barracks."

Jaina pinched the bridge of her nose and stopped just out of the shadow of a statue honoring one of the founders of Dalaran. The stone was worn, much like how her temper was at the moment. She missed Vereesa at this moment, if only because Vereesa was as blunt as a mace, whereas she felt her weaknesses and habits being prodded by the eldest Windrunner. Usually, she'd dance the steps until the conversation wound naturally to a revelation point, but she'd spent the entire day listening to farming rights and was, frankly, exhausted. "Lady Alleria, I don't know where Vereesa is."

Alleria blinked at her, all faux-innocence underneath Jaina's withering stare before she sighed. "I know she's angry with me, and I wouldn't ask you to break her trust if I didn't -"

Jaina held up a hand. "I swear on the Tides, Lady Alleria, I don't know where Vereesa is. Why?" That previous sense of dread returned. "Did something happen?"

Alleria studied her much like a lynx contemplates the rabbit. That arcane gaze was enough to set Jaina's last nerve on edge, and she reflexively took a step back just to provide distance. "I would have sworn she'd tell you, at least, seeing that you're …" Alleria waved a hand vaguely in Jaina's direction. "You know."

Jaina didn't know.

Alleria sighed again and shifted her stance. "I don't mind. If Vereesa's happy, then I'm happy. I mean, she's my baby sister so I -"

Jaina had lowered her hand, but it snapped back up. "Wait. Wait. You think Vereesa and I …" she copied Alleria's hand-motion, then felt her cheeks warm. "No! We're - we're friends!"

"What - really?" Alleria's head canted to the side. "I - huh. All right," she kept staring at Jaina as if she wasn't entirely convinced. "So," she ran a hand through her hair, "you haven't seen Vereesa since ...when?"

Jaina still reeled from the implications that she and Vereesa were together and that Alleria would have been fine with it. Well, as fine as an older sister ever could be about their sibling dating another person. She crossed her arms, hoping to create even more distance between Alleria and herself, and used the gesture to try and think on the actual issue on the table.

"She was there when the Hinterland rights were established - the Silver Covenant wanted to establish a breeding ground for their hippogryphs along the northern ridges," Jaina mused, "that's the last time I saw her?"

Alleria frowned, "I met with her afterward. We … talked." Alleria's ears twitched, "then she stormed out."

"What did you talk about?" Jaina pressed for elaboration.

Alleria hesitated. She stared out over the street, breaking eye contact. "Our people, mostly. She's still bothered about Kivan's death -"

"It was fairly traumatic," Jaina felt the need to point out.

Alleria waved a dismissive hand. "It's not the how, but the why that bothered her."

Jaina disagreed, but kept her thoughts to herself. She watched Alleria watch the road and the few travelers upon it for a little while before she prompted the conversation further. She was hungry, and it was growing late enough that the main kitchen of the Lounge would be closed by the time she returned.

"Vereesa believes I'm recruiting the Silver Covenant, and she's worried that I'll get the last of the Quel'dorei killed."

Jaina didn't quite know how to respond to that. "Aren't you?" was what she finally went it. Alleria's glower sent a chill of fear down Jaina's spine. "I … that's the perception."

"Of course I'm not recruiting! The Void is my burden to bear - and the first of the Ren'dorei were … accidental. I did what I needed to so they could be saved."

"The Ren'dorei ranks are growing, though."

"The Void promises the power and cunning to protect their families and win back their lands," Alleria explained.

"That's a passive way to see the situation. You're the Alleria Windrunner - even the human kingdoms lift you up as a hero to be admired."

Alleria's glower darkened. "How tempting are those Tidesage scrolls, Lady Jaina? You haven't risked a peek at the abyssal rites, have you? For research purposes only, of course."

Jaina flushed. She'd had to lock away the Tidesage scrolls deep within one of the safes offered by the Lounge and spent a few hours every night struggling with the urge to unlock and read through the texts.

Alleria watched her, victorious, but not smug. "The Void promises infinite solutions to their problems. I might be 'the Alleria Windrunner,' but I can only advise and train after they follow the call." The victorious look faded into a troubled one. "The Locus-Walker and Magister Umbric ...aren't as concerned as I am about the growing numbers." Alleria's fingers twitched, catching Jaina's attention, and she wondered what the elven ranger was missing. Probably her bow?

Then Alleria was on the move, with a dismissive: "thank you, Lady Jaina. I suppose I need to find Khadgar now."

"Khadgar?" Jaina picked up the pace to match Alleria's stride. "Wait, Lady Alleria, you just told me you believe Vereesa's missing -"

"Not quite. I simply asked if she told you where she was heading." Alleria tossed her a sidelong glance. "As you don't know -"

"We might not be involved, but she's my closest friend. If there's something going on, I'd like to help." She gambled, "and any spell you need Khadgar to perform, I could manage it more efficiently and discreetly."

That got Alleria to slow down and turn back to face Jaina properly. "You don't even know what I'll ask him."

"You're looking for Vereesa, but you haven't gone after her yourself - even though you are one of the premier trackers outside the Huntmaster herself. That suggests that you're worried someone _else_ will notice her disappearance." Jaina took the lead in their nightly stroll. She didn't head back to the Lounge - her room was far too public for what she anticipated Alleria would need.

Alleria watched her with a calculating look, but allowed the shift in control as she followed on. "Continue."

"There are several excellent trackers in the Alliance, but you haven't tasked them with this -"

"What makes you so certain I haven't?"

"You wouldn't have approached me otherwise."

Alleria hummed.

"So, the Alliance trackers aren't tapped, and SI:7 wouldn't be involved because we've already established that you don't want Vereesa's absence to be noted. You have rangers in the ren'dorei ranks but …" Jaina trailed off, and noted how Alleria didn't prod her to finish her thought. The eldest Windrunner assessed her, and waited for Jaina's thoughts to gather on their own.

The pair walked into the gardens and Jaina led them further to the outer wall. She waved her hand, and the stone moved aside to allow them out onto the Edge itself. Out there, the wind that blew south from over the lake was biting cold this high up, but ate noise in a way that a simple masking spell couldn't. No one walked the Edge anymore, really.

"It wouldn't be a matter of trust with the ren'dorei, but perhaps that they can't accomplish the task? Which means Vereesa's gone somewhere that the ren'dorei can't physically go."

Alleria tucked her cloak tight about her shoulders. Her ears were pinned close to her head, and she had nearly all of her exposed skin hidden away underneath the heavy linen; but Jaina could see the faint smile that twitched at Alleria's lip. "So, what am I about to go ask Khadgar about that you could perform so much more admirably for me?"

Jaina's cheeks warmed. She spun to face the smooth wall, and harkened the sudden blush to the fact that the wind was freezing cold. Yes. The wind. Certainly not because Alleria's voice was smooth like silk and that it had been far too long since -

"Lady Jaina?" Alleria sounded amused.

Oh, to the blight with the Windrunner sisters. Jaina reached deep within herself and curled a fist tight around a pulse of powerful, electric energy. It rumbled in her bones like an oncoming storm and as she drew it up and out of her spirit, her body ached.

Without looking, she held out her hand toward Alleria. "Vereesa's necklace, please."

A moment later, silver piled into her palm as Alleria placed a locket there. Jaina's fingers closed around it. With a wild gesture, she flung her other hand out toward the stone and like a storm-surge, an image crashed onto the walls. It shimmered with arcane and threatened to spill out as the spell's focus nearly slipped the leash.

Jaina wound it in, centering the magic upon Vereesa. The scry sharpened until simple details could be discerned.

Alleria stepped forward, amusement forgotten. "This is western Lordaeron, but I can't discern exactly where in - _belore,_ Vereesa, you stubborn child!"

Jaina took a sliver of her concentration to actually observe the image the scrying spell painted. The details shifted and glimmered in and out of view, much like the tide. She also recognized the dour forests of Lordaeron's northern forests, and the blight that saturated the land and sickened the trees until they were black, broken things against the cloudless sky.

"She's in the northern mountains," Alleria's voice echoed Jaina's own thoughts. "With the blight, though, I don't even know how she got through? Wait. What banner is that?"

Jaina glanced up again. Alleria pointed to a faded ivory banner trimmed with a dark red. In the center was a stylized L that looked more like a C and threaded in the same rich, red color as the trim. She knew the banner well, "that is the banner of the Scarlet Crusade. They were a group of former Silver Hand."

" _Belore,_ Little Moon, you just had to be difficult," Alleria muttered, eyes locked onto the fluttering flag. "This Scarlet Crusade, were they Light-Wielders?"

Jaina nodded, and as Vereesa walked forward into the shadow of a cathedral's tower that she thought she'd never see again. "Yes, they had sanctified themselves to better battle the Scourge and the Forsaken."

"No wonder I could never track her down," Alleria ran a hand through her hair. "Lovely."

"Lady Alleria," Jaina turned to the eldest Windrunner, resting a hand on her hip as she offered the necklace back with the other one. "As promised, far more efficient than Khadgar -"

"But I wouldn't say it was more discreet," Alleria finished for her, taking the necklace back. The two of them looked on as the scryed Vereesa met someone who waited for her underneath the archway, and though the details were murky due to Jaina's divided concentration, there were enough clues to put together -

"That's -" Jaina cut off the name with a hiss.

Alleria's eyes gleamed in the shadows next to her. "You understand, I hope, the reason why I wanted to keep Vereesa's absence quiet?"

Jaina nodded. "As far as the Alliance is concerned, your sister died in the Battle for Silvermoon." She turned to Alleria, and with her concentration fully broken, the scrying image faded on the wall. "How are we going to get Vereesa back, then?"

Alleria canted her head, weighing the option of trusting Jaina, before she sighed. "Let me buy you a drink, and we'll have a proper talk."

As the two of them headed back into Dalaran properly, the wind picked up on the ash of the scrying spell itself. The last detail to disappear was the crimson gaze that burned bright in the dark beyond the doorway.


	4. Chapter 4

Alleria led Jaina to the rather sparse space the ranger claimed for herself in Dalaran. It sat high above the covered alleyway and shared a balcony space with the adjoining greenhouse. On the balcony, plants twisted around the supports and along the wall, and the fragrance kept the blacksmith mostly as a visual nuisance.

As Alleria went to fetch the glasses, Jaina took it upon herself to do what every self-affirmed curious person should do when they enter the space of another: snoop. Jaina didn't touch anything, of course, but she scoured the walls and the few personal touches to learn more about the elusive eldest sister.

There weren't many. The rooms felt less like a home, and more like an army tent - a place to rest and recuperate between struggles. On a desk near to the back window, next to a curtained-off room, was a pile of architectural papers detailing the commissioned work for not just one of the elven spire-estates that Quel'Thalas had been famous for, but the restoration of several buildings.

"Vereesa felt it a bit macabre to try and revive the estate, but Windrunner Spire was the home of my family for thousands of years. I can't let it crumble." Alleria had returned from the adjoining kitchenette, a pair of steaming mugs in her hands. She offered one to Jaina, then stood next to her. "My family's ancestral lands are far enough away from Silvermoon and the Sunwell that the ren'dorei can return to Quel'Thalas without risking contact."

"It gives your people a homeland too," Jaina observed.

Alleria smiled and took a sip of her drink. "Yes. We've been refugees a bit too long."

Jaina took a moment to indulge in the offered drink. The scent of spiced cider brought back memories of her girlhood, tucked into an overstuffed armchair with a crackling fireplace and an evening of stories to look forward to. On the colder nights, Tandred would be there as well looking over the requirements to apply to the naval academy, his unkempt mop of hair continually spilling over into his eyes. When she shook the memories from her mind, Alleria had stepped away from the desk.

Right. There was an actual reason Jaina was here.

Jaina followed, and once Alleria perched herself on a stool, Jaina brought the chair from the desk over so they could converse. "How secure are we?"

Alleria glanced around her living quarters, "most of the occupants of this building prefer their comings, goings, and all other activities to go as unnoticed as possible. We can discuss what we need to."

Jaina held her mug tighter. "Right. So… she survived?"

Alleria worried her lip with a fang. Jaina didn't blame her for the hesitation. Three years ago, Jaina had been one of the loudest of the voices calling for the head of the Banshee, and it had been her magic that served the vanguard that broke the defenses of Silvermoon. Though, with recollection, Alleria had been right there at her side championing the Alliance's offensive efforts.

Finally, Alleria's shoulders slumped. Her ears lowered, and her gaze went somewhere at Jaina's hip. "She's my sister."

"I had to put down Derek - I understand -"

"No, Jaina," without the honorific, her name was a blunt weapon, "you don't understand. You knew your brother for, what, nearly forty years?"

"He was still my brother."

"She was my sister for over a thousand years, and then when I fought the legion, she was one of the lights that reminded me I had a home to fight for."

"You said it yourself, though, that she should have been put down!"

"A threat said when I'm certain she's being taken into custody is not the same as actually facing the possibility that she's truly about to be killed!" The void licked around the edges of Alleria's form, distorted and rippling like the ocean during a storm.

Jaina held up a hand. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to imply anything."

Alleria snarled wordlessly and got up to pace. The frenetic energy swirled around her with each pass; whispers crawled along the open space between them. Intangible, incomprehensible, but loud enough that the myriad chorus tickled at that empty spot in Jaina's psyche. She closed her eyes, counted slowly backward from twenty, and did not open them until she heard Alleria alight upon the stool once again.

The ranger looked defeated. Alleria set her mug on the counter behind her and folded her hands loosely in her lap. Alleria stared morosely at her fingers and looked so much like Vereesa did that Jaina couldn't help but feel for her.

"I was supposed to protect them." Alleria said, "Sylvanas, and Vereesa. After the orcs came through - we were all that was left. So, when it came the time - no, Jaina, I couldn't find it in my heart to murder my sister at the gates of the nation that she died to defend for the second time."

Jaina stayed quiet. She'd learned well enough that silence prompted a conversation much further than words at times.

It proved true with Alleria. The eldest Windrunner squared her shoulders and sat up straight. She'd plucked up her mug again, and settled her uncanny gaze firmly on Jaina. "Are you satisfied with my reason?"

"That's not -" Jaina bit off her retort. "The Scarlet Monastery is tucked high into the northern mountains, and those mountains are saturated with the Blight. How did Vereesa even get there safely?"

"A question that she can answer for us once you retrieve her."

Jaina didn't even argue that point. Alleria couldn't disappear from the public spotlight, not without attracting attention that the Windrunners wouldn't want; where Jaina had an excellent excuse to recuse herself from the daily barrage of negotiations. And this was Vereesa - the one person alive that Jaina wouldn't second-guess going after.

Jaina slumped back against her seat; all of her senses alert at the chance to riddle out a puzzle. "She left, what, eight or nine days ago?"

"Nine," Alleria said.

"The scrying spell shows us the events as they're occurring. In nine days, Vereesa wouldn't have even reached Lordaeron's borders."

Alleria's brow arched. "Are you judging by the common horse or a quel'dorei courser?"

"The courser, since I believe Vereesa still has Gallant, no? Even pushed to his limits, at best, he'd have reached Lordaeron City itself, but there are another few weeks of travel northeast, and you've got the Blight, the foothills, and then the mountain passes themselves."

"Are you assuming she went through Alterac itself, or along the Silverpine Road?"

"Alterac. There's less traffic that way, and the rugged terrain doesn't slow down a courser that terribly. Silverpine would add another two weeks to her travel needs."

"What if she took her hippogryph? That's a direct shot."

At first, Jaina thought Alleria was teasing her, but when she looked up to catch the ranger in the act, she found Alleria's brow furrowed in thought and her gaze severe and intense as she waited for Jaina's answer.

Jaina tapped her mug. "Nine days of travel? Andorhal - at best. Wait!" She surged up and nearly spilled her cider. "Vereesa knows you, Alleria."

"I would hope so?"

"So she knows how you track, and your limits. She didn't want you to follow her, and any ordinary means of travel would put you on her tail immediately, but what about a portal?"

"I'm elven, we can pick up the trace arcane in the air after a portal is opened, even with the stabilization wards the Shal'dorei telemancers built." Alleria shook her head, dismissing the line of theory.

"Ah, but a portal opened upon sanctified ground?"

"I wouldn't be able to get close enough to pick up the trail -" Alleria lifted her gaze from the map and rewarded Jaina with a small, but still brilliant smile. "Lady Jaina, I think you're onto something."

Jaina ducked her head, and knew she was blushing, but returned the smile. "My qualifications for the title of Archmage were centered around portal and location magical theory and practice."

"So you're a tracker-mage. Interesting." Alleria kept looking at her, and Jaina grew more and more fidgety underneath that scrutinizing look. "I have an idea."

Alleria scrambled off the stool fast enough that it clattered to the ground as she ducked behind the curtain. Jaina heard rustling, and of things being tossed around peppered with the delightful musical lilt of elvish cursing. Or what she assumed was elvish cursing. She sipped her cider and waited for Alleria to return, and used the moment to recover her composure.

When Alleria did return, it was with a pile of scrolls haphazardly tucked underneath her arm that she unceremoniously dumped upon the floor. She knelt and unfurled each of them until she found the map of Lordaeron Kingdom. It was a bit outdated - without the upheaval of the Cataclysm, but it worked.

"Lady Jaina, since you're the expert on locational theory - can you point out where this Monastery is?"

Jaina had to get down on the floor next to Alleria, but the rush of working through something that wasn't politics had her caring little about the improbability of the situation. She conjured up a pair of calipers to assist her in tracing out the distance before she tapped a space on the western side of the North Lordaeron Mountains.

"The only monastery I know of in the mountains was the old Tirisfal one."

Alleria circled it with a charcoal stick. "Now, we know that Vereesa just arrived at the Monastery, so if she took Gallant through the portal …" she made an estimated circle, "and if we want to assume she took her hippogryph instead, we can extend it …"

"About as far south as Andorhal."

"Ah, but Andorhal would not have a portal set upon sanctified ground, and we've forgotten one important fact," Alleria rocked back on her haunches, "the blight is airborne, so a hippogryph wouldn't be exactly useful to her. So, we've got Gallant, and a Sanctified Portal which brings us to …" she crossed an X over Hearthglen.

"Why would Hearthglen be considered holy ground?"

"It is where Tirion Fordring took command. His martyrdom at the Battle of the Broken Shore is something the Lightforged take very seriously. They would be quick to ensure the hometown of one of their High Exarch's paladins is under their watch." Alleria's jaw tightened. "Perhaps I could just swallow my pride and ask the Huntsmaster to track her from there - the Lightforged actually like her thanks to the help on Argus."

"The Huntsmaster? The woman who would shoot you at four hundred paces with your family's own bow?" Jaina shook her head. "I'll go. Within four days I'll have Vereesa home and safe, and absolutely no one will be the wiser. I've got the perfect plan."

Two days, a haggling match with a stable master who would make the Bilgewater proud, a pounding headache; and faced with the treacherous mountain passes later; Jaina had absolutely no plan and for a solid second of her life regretted that she knew any of the Windrunner sisters.

Hearthglen had been, as Alleria mentioned, more like a garrisoned tomb than a living, breathing town. It was within the high stone walls that Jaina saw the realized potential of a city built on the ideals and preachings of the naaru. There was a vitality in the land that warmed Jaina's heart but at the price of a rigidness that struck through the town like an iron lattice. Was it the brief touch with the void that made her uneasy here? She'd traveled to the few outposts that the kaldorei had allowed outsiders to wander, and even among the secretive and wary night elves, she felt more welcomed than she had in a town that honored a human hero.

Now, though, the prospect of dealing with the Lightforged seemed far more pleasing than trekking through the mountains. She'd taken the southern road along to the Northridge Lumber Camp on the excuse that she was on a pilgrimage to Uther's Tomb before she returned to Kul Tiras. She didn't expect that she'd been followed, or her movements tracked, but still - best not to have the Lightforged curious about why an archmage was invested in a mountaineering trip.

Once in the Hearthglen Hills, she was able to move freely. Before the Blight unleashed in the Battle for Lordaeron, the Argent Dawn bounties had brought plenty of mercenaries from both the Alliance and the Horde forces to cull the numbers of both the plagued beasts and scourged dead that once roamed the old growth forest. After the Blight, the trails were quiet and empty save for the occasional resistant creature that could be avoided with an incantation of invisibility. She remembered many of the old hunting treks from her summers with the Menethil family so made progress despite the hostile terrain.

Another two days and a night spent with the unpleasant feeling of being watched passed before Jaina snagged her first clue just as she left the lowland trails for the narrow cliffs. It was crudely etched, and anyone without specific arcane training would have passed it off as a quirk of erosion, but Jaina spent too many decades studying magical theory to assume that common thought. The rune was cleverly hidden in the natural setting of the stone, but as she traced over the shape with her fingers, Jaina found herself scrawling out an elven warding rune - and a powerful one at that. She could still feel the subtle grooves of the chisel that cut out the shape. You haven't been here long enough to be worn down by the elements yet, have you?

There was just one problem. The runestone faced towards the western foothills, towards the Scarlet Monastery itself. Whatever it protected was located higher in the eastern ridges and the scrying …

Was now five days distance.

Well, Jaina might not have had a plan per say, but she had her talents, and she had expected this. She found a blank, smooth section of the cliff and unwound Vereesa's locket from its space in her pack. A reach within her for the scrying spell and -

Nothing.

The spell splashed harmlessly on the stone like she'd done little more than toss a bucket at the cliff.

Well, the Blight was entropic in nature, and it could have been possible that it saturated the ley-lines that Jaina drew from. She could adjust to that. She took a minute to scratch chalk symbols on the stone to focus the channeled spell and to adjust for the potential drain of the Blight itself.

She reached within herself again, seized the spell, and launched it against the runes.

They bubbled, boiled, and melted down the cliff. Jaina faced nothing.

"What on Azeroth…?"

Right. The third time would be the charm. She redid the runes, and then took several minutes to center herself. She reached for the ley-line first to anchor her spell into the land and ground herself along the magical current.

She heard a faint hum of power.

She cracked open an eye to stare at the nearby runestone. The elven runestone. The practically perfectly replicated runestone of the warding magic that had protected Quel'Thalas for nearly seven thousand years.

Well. A good thing, then, that she'd already used Alleria's insider knowledge of the runestone's connections to the nexus of ley lines to infiltrate an elven sanctum, wasn't it? And since she was not acting as a taxi for a strike team, she did not need a week to prepare for the teleport.

She just needed a night.

Jaina made camp close to the runestone, finding that the warding magic also worked to keep the Blight at a distance and granted her a safe perimeter that she didn't need to keep refreshing every hour. For a moment, she wondered if it would be wiser to teleport her steed to Uther's Tomb to throw off anyone who got curious - but a well-versed mage would be able to discern the spell. So, she took the time to work Scout - as she'd come to name the mare - into the teleport.

When she felt secure in the structure of the spell, she allowed herself a few hours of uneasy but recovering sleep. She might have been five days behind Vereesa's travel, but if she were right, then this would rapidly close the distance the ranger hoped to have kept between them.

Morning came and with it a miserable mist. The bit of rest Jaina managed had restored enough of her reserves that she felt ready to tackle the wards. She gathered her things and followed the lessons from Vereesa on how to make her campsite disappear. Then, she brought her staff from where she'd had it tucked away with the rest of the meager supplies Scout carried. The staff brimmed with the stolen power of the Thunder King and served as a perfect source to draw from for her spellwork. She wagered on whatever mage had established the wards to have protections against most mortal arcane spellweavers - they must have learned from the breach of Eversong's defenses, but could they predict a Titan-sourced spell?

She hoped not as she called the spell into existence. She smelt ozone as the magic swirled around her and the mare. She felt the rumble of the earth beneath her feet as she sent was little more than a magical lockpick to turn the tumblers of the ward itself. Scout let out a nervous whinny next to her, but the mare didn't attempt to bolt. She was either trained to tolerate magic, or she was too frightened to move. Either answer worked for Jaina.

There was a pressure in the space she existed in.

Then there wasn't.

Where once there was the quiet awakening of a woods, there was now merely silence. A total silence that turned Jaina's heartbeat into a drum that thundered against her ribcage. Scout's pawing was a metronome that rung out in the middle of a sprawling courtyard that once saw life.

Now, the crumbled ruins around Jaina only served to highlight the inevitable decay that everything would succumb to.

But what were the ruins? Jaina kept Scout's reins in hand as she moved through a plaza that reminded her all at once of Suramar's outlying districts, the elaborate spiral construction of Quel'Thalas, and the love of nature that Darnassus had shown in every bit of architecture. She thought of the Dire Maul in Feralas and found similarities in how nature had reclaimed much of the space she stood in.

Many of the buildings were in such a state of disrepair that Jaina first believed that she'd miscalculated, and now she'd be stuck traveling who knew how long back to where the boundary runestone was, but as she wandered through the unnatural stillness, she heard something.

It was white noise at first, the babble of a brook, but as Jaina's hearing adjusted to the quiet of the ruins, she began to pick out the lilting rise and fall of Thalassian. She knew that voice.

"Vereesa?" She called out. She quickened her pace, ears pricked toward Vereesa's voice. Her friend sounded angry - no - furious. Her Thalassian was rapid, too fast for Jaina to follow. "Vereesa?"

There was that feeling of being watched again. Jaina felt the weight of more than a hundred eyes settle on her shoulders. She swore she heard voices whispering as she rushed into a spire that looked like it had seen some restoration work.

"Anaria malanore -" a pause, then a throaty laugh, "Little Moon, I figured after the first one, you would have learned to stay away from humans."

Jaina knew that sibilant rasp. She had planned to encounter her after the scrying spell revelation, but hearing the ghostly hiss of a woman she'd believed long-dead immediately amped all of Jaina's survival instincts.

"What are you talking about, Sylvanas?" Vereesa sighed.

Jaina gripped her staff. In her other hand, she summoned an ice lance that would shatter and ricochet if deflected. She'd use it to distract, then get close. Grab Vereesa, then blink out.

"Are you so self-absorbed now that you didn't hear your pet arriving?"

Jaina swallowed a deep breath. So much for the advantage of surprise. She lowered the ice lance and rounded the final corner. As soon as she saw Vereesa, she assessed her for obvious harm. There were no bruises, no cuts, nothing that suggested she'd been hurt. "Vereesa! Thank the Light you're ok."

Jaina's gaze locked on the second elf in the room. "You are not going to stop me."

The Banshee Queen, ex-Warchief and Dark Lady might not have been wearing her Warchief Plate, but even in the practical dark leather and mail, she struck an imposing figure that commanded Jaina's attention. The years of exile had not seemed to ruffle the undead ranger, for she still held that same cold, arrogant smirk that had encouraged Jaina to spend years of her life attempting to wipe it from the Banshee Queen's face. She found that urge was still as strong even now.

Sylvanas Windrunner held up her hands, her smirk dropping in favor of a more simpering expression; it was as false as the fiend's grasp on life itself. "I notice the Alliance still has yet to learn the manners on how to conduct themselves in my home. Vereesa is a guest! And she is as free to leave as the birds themselves."

Jaina ignored her and turned her sights back on Vereesa. She held out her hand, tried to school a welcoming, encouraging smile on her face. "Vereesa. Come with me. We can go back to Dalaran and - " her eyes flickered to where Sylvanas stood.

"What? No. You shouldn't even be here, Jaina. How did you even -?"

"Alleria. She couldn't find you, and she got worried." Jaina glanced to Sylvanas, who had not moved from her original spot. The Banshee Queen had dropped the simpering act and now watched the pair of them with a bored expression. Jaina extended her hand again to Vereesa. "It looks like she had every right to! Vereesa, I understand that Kivan scared you, ok and that you're afraid you're going to lose your sisters but -"

Jaina couldn't believe what she was about to say, "but we can bring Sylvanas back with us. She can stand trial -" she ignored the snort of derision from the undead elf, " - and we can have justice seen."

"You … don't understand at all." Vereesa shook her head. She picked up her bow with a trembling hand. Jaina blinked. Had Sylvanas told the truth about Vereesa's lack of imprisonment? She glanced a third time to the banshee who only gave her a cool stare in return. Vereesa's hand gripped the handle white-knuckled. "Jaina. You are my dearest friend, so please believe me when I tell you that you need to go. Right now."

"Vereesa, I -" Jaina stopped as Vereesa nocked the bow and drew the sting back to where it brushed her cheek. "Veressa?"

"Well now" Sylvanas drawled. "I thought I was in for another dull morning!" The ex-Warchief of the Horde slipped over to a worn chair and fell into it like it was the very throne she'd been deposed from. She tucked a hand underneath her chin and watched the stand-off with a malicious gleam to her gaze. "I'm so grateful I was wrong."


	5. Chapter 5

A cold, pale light illuminated Vereesa from above and cast her features in long, sharp lines. Jaina could detect the faint tremor in the elf's hand as Vereesa held the arrow aimed at her shoulder - or what Jaina hoped was her shoulder.

"Vereesa…" Jaina gentled her voice, lifted her hand, and lowered her staff.

Vereesa was brash. Impulsive. There were quite a few times after the loss of Theramore where Jaina had to be the reasonable one, but even with Vereesa's history of reckless action, she wouldn't draw fire on Jaina without good reason.

Or perhaps Vereesa was underneath a spell.

Jaina's attention flickered to Sylvanas.

"You won't lay a hand on her," Vereesa warned.

Ah. There it was. Alleria had lashed out about the same thing. This was a conversation Jaina had already experienced, and, she hoped, knew how to de-escalate.

"I can offer her the protection of Kul Tiras so she can see a fair trial -"

"A fair trial?" Vereesa scoffed, "and where would you find such a thing in the world now?"

"In Boralus. As Lord Admiral, I can oversee -"

"I'd be at the 'mercy' of my sister's night-light in less than a week -"

Jaina tossed Sylvanas a scowl, "Not helping."

"Oh, I didn't realize I was supposed to be." Sylvanas regained that simpering tone and unfurled herself from the chair to approach the standoff itself. "Allow me to ...illuminate you, dear Lord Admiral, on the futility of trying to see 'justice' done in a world where there is no truth but your precious Light."

Jaina had to tilt her head to maintain eye contact. Sylvanas was several inches taller, and she wielded the height difference line she would use a weapon. "The Lightforged have no political power anywhere on Kul Tiras."

"They wouldn't need political power. They'd just need a martyr to see the deed done before I even left the mainland."

"So you should get to live out your days in peace while the innocents you slaughtered are denied their closure?"

Sylvanas smirked, the faintest hint of her fangs showed against the line of her lips. "Have you paid penance for the Sunreavers you and my sister cut down yet, Lord Admiral? Or do you just ignore that gruesome little stain on the consciousness of the Alliance when you count the losses of war? Are their names on the memorials to the fallen?"

"Sylvanas," Vereesa chastised.

Sylvanas cast that crimson gaze upon her youngest sister. "My apologies, dear sister. I didn't realize that you were the only one allowed to fire off shots in this conversation."

Vereesa seemed to notice the arrow she aimed towards Jaina, and like she was shaken out of a haze, she dropped the stance. She carefully lessened the tension on the string and set the bow down back against her thigh. Her ears drooped as she let out a long, defeated sigh. "Jaina …"

Jaina shook her head. "No, I - I understand wanting to defend your sister; and you didn't actually shoot me so …" she knew the smile she gave wasn't as natural as she'd hoped for. "No harm, no foul?"

Vereesa disagreed, but her body visibly relaxed a fraction more. "Alleria sent you?"

"You sound surprised."

"No, just - " Vereesa fidgeted, and her gaze darted up towards the light source. "I thought I'd thrown the trail better than -"

"You showed up here barely a day after her," Sylvanas finished for her sister. She prowled back to the seat; without the promise of imminent violence, she didn't seem keen to involve herself in the conversation further. Nor, it seemed, was she willing to just leave them to it. She reclaimed her seat and resumed watching them with her previous bored expression.

Vereesa rarely showed it, but Jaina knew that an almost zealous need to prove herself drove the high elf in nearly all aspects of her life. It had been there like a simmering fire when they'd first met, and only sparked higher with every passing year.

When Alleria had arrived at Krasus' Landing alongside the Champions four years back, Jaina had been there - if only because even she wasn't immune to the sudden whiplash of planetary annihilation to a surprising victory. Jaina remembered the cry of jubilation as the long-lost Sons of Lothar finally returned to Azeroth. She remembered watching Vereesa smile so brightly that it looked a little fragile, but even then, the youngest Windrunner had situated herself as the proud sibling content to stand off to the side.

It was the same now. Jaina could see the mental steps Vereesa was taking to bury her true thoughts underneath a placid exterior.

"It was sheer luck. Scout - er, the mare I'd loaned from Hearthglen - picked up a rock in her forehoof. I caught the bottom half of the warding rune …" Jaina's attempt to soothe Vereesa's pride wasn't going anywhere. "Uhm."

Well. Jaina felt awkward.

Vereesa was not in need of rescue, and the looming specter of Sylvanas Windrunner's legacy was lost in the reality of a brooding elf.

"Alleria couldn't track you at all," Jaina blurted out. "She was desperate enough to think about reaching out to the Huntmaster -"

Despite herself, Vereesa snorted. "I'm sure Mistwalker is heartbroken that she missed an opportunity to practice with her favorite target."

"When Alleria approached me, we had to work through a pretty powerful scrying spell, and if I hadn't found the rune, then I'd still be on my way to the Monastery, and then I'd be lost because I am not a ranger. At all."

Vereesa quirked a skeptical brow. "Well, I'm sorry you trekked all the way out here, but when you return, you can let Alleria know I'm fine and that I'll be out here for a while."

"How long is a while?"

Vereesa shrugged. "As long as I want to visit my sister. I didn't realize I had to ensure you were a part of the decision, Jaina."

Jaina rubbed at her temple. Vereesa had reason to come out here. Sylvanas, even a deposed and relatively-toothless Sylvanas, was not the sort of family one just happened to drop in for a routine reunion. There was something here that Vereesa was invested in - but what?

"All right, Vereesa." Jaina could admit defeat, and if she was honest, she'd done her bit. She'd found Vereesa, and if Alleria wants to worry about dragging her stubborn sister home, it's on her. Jaina made for the archway, not looking forward to the long ride back, nor was she looking forward to informing Alleria in a few weeks.

Jaina paused. Her fingers tapped along her staff. She had one last trick she could try. "Alleria didn't mention that the twins were worried about you…" she murmured. Jaina glanced over her shoulder. "What lie did you tell them?"

"Excuse me?"

"What did you tell your boys, Vereesa, to assure them about your departure? Because I need to know what story I've got to keep up when they wonder where their mother is?"

Vereesa's eyes flashed a vivid sapphire. "How dare -"

"Because you wouldn't have gone through the trouble of keeping Alleria as far off your tail as you have if you expected to be back soon. So, what did you tell them? Archaeological dig? A mission to the front-line down in Silithus?"

"Stop it!"

Jaina met Vereesa's gaze head-on. The ranger was stubborn, but so was she.

"I'm here for Alleria, for my sons, and for the few quel'dorei that are left. Does that satisfy you?"

Jaina crossed her arms, brow raised. "That isn't good enough, and you know it."

Vereesa responded with a scowl. She pushed her hand through her hair, dragging her fingers through the silver strands. "What I know is that every single day, I'm watching my people give themselves up to the light, or to the void. Every single day, one of the quel'dorei decides that Alleria's path is worth the risk and -" she snarled wordlessly, her hands clenched into fists. "Kivan isn't an outlier. His issue is becoming more and more common for the ren'dorei, and it's going to happen to Alleria eventually."

"What does that have to do with the Ba- with your sister?" Jaina refused to voice Sylvanas' name. Better to keep her categorized in impersonal nouns.

"Sylvanas and her dark rangers are impervious to the Void, even beyond what the average forsaken could tolerate - or the average Death Knight."

Vereesa wasn't wrong. When Azshara's involvement in the Azerite Wars had been revealed, there had come another one of the infamous 'truces' that forced the Horde and the Alliance into an uneasy partnership to push back the Naga. It lasted long enough for the Champions to rally through a final assault, though it had left Azeroth herself weakened.

At the lowest point, it had been the Dark Rangers that served as the messengers to and from the battle lines the Champions carved in the dark depths. They had been the only troops - even beyond the ren'dorei - that had been utterly immune to the call of N'zoth so close by.

"You want to know why, and if it's possible to transfer whatever it is they have to Alleria." Jaina felt like someone drained her lungs of air. "What does She get out of all of this?"

Sylvanas answered before Vereesa could, "why, the warm feeling of a deed well done, of course."

Jaina resisted the urge to hurl an ice-lance in her direction. "Vereesa?"

"We're sisters. I asked for help, she obliged."

Vereesa was lying, but Jaina had no evidence to back that up; only a gut feeling. "So, let me help you then -" she spoke faster, and louder when Vereesa started to protest. "This is the fabled Falor'Thalas, isn't it? Where your people landed when they arrived in the Eastern Kingdoms?"

Vereesa nodded, her protest paused for the moment. "I'm surprised you knew that, but yes, this is the Wintering Land. Come on, follow me." She slung her bow over her shoulder and caught a look from Sylvanas. "What? She's going to find out anyway."

Jaina mentally agreed that she would have, and followed Vereesa out into the courtyard once again. After a moment, she heard the soft press of leather-soled boots fall into step behind them.

With the overgrowth, it was difficult to make out the sunshine beyond the canopy that stretched over their heads, but here and there stray strands of sunlight spun a lazy path down to where they stood. It gave the space a tranquil quiet that Jaina wouldn't have pictured the Banshee Queen being content to linger in. Yet, there they were. Vereesa and her blinked with the adjustment to daylight, Sylvanas merely tilted her head up into the breeze and stared off at a rustling branch.

Vereesa moved with coiled anger to her steps as she led them past where Scout grazed on wild grasses. The mare lifted her head when the elves approached and wickered fondly as Jaina passed by, before returning to her meal.

They walked towards what looked to have been a temple of some sort, the statues that once must have been magnificent worn down by time and elements to be little more than smooth stone spires. Unhappy with Sylvanas taking up the rear-guard, Jaina kept her wits and her staff close by as they stepped through the broken pieces of history. Vereesa stopped before a section of crumbled flooring that must have collapsed decades ago, what with the vines that tangled along the dark passage.

"Listen."

Jaina walked to the edge and tried to do just that. Even with the stillness of the lost city, the simple truth of the Banshee Queen standing behind her prevented her from centering her senses too much.

The soft brush of a whisper against her mind didn't need her senses attuned, though. Jaina's eyes snapped open and met Vereesa's steady look.

"That's …"

"Not exactly the void - but it's close enough that it's a strong lead. There's evidence that our ancestors went down into whatever ruins are below us and yet we survived as a people to make it to Quel'Thalas."

"Vereesa …" Jaina worried at her lip. "The quel'dorei are tempted daily by the promise of the void - what makes you think you're immune to it?"

Vereesa's ears flattened. "I'm working on an immunity -"

Suddenly, ice seized Jaina as a sickening realization dawned on her. It was a stretch, a horrible stretch, but Jaina feared she knew exactly what Sylvanas was going to get out of Vereesa's trip, and why the youngest Windrunner had taken so many steps to try and hold off pursuit for as long as possible. Jaina's staff nearly tumbled out of her grasp as she stumbled from the shock. "You're going to let her Raise you."

Vereesa's ears, so animate even when her face was a neutral mask, swiveled back and forth. She didn't speak for a moment, then: "that's absurd."

"Is it?" Jaina pushed forward, away from the whispering chasm, and towards the nervous ranger. "By the Tides, Vereesa, are you insane? What about your sons - are you even thinking about them?"

"Of course I'm thinking about them!" Vereesa snapped, mask dropping to reveal desperate, hungry grief. "I'm thinking about the day they follow the lure of powerful magic because their elven blood craves it like a drug. I'm thinking about the night they have to learn that their aunt was killed for her own safety - I'm thinking about what you'll have to tell them when I turn out just like Kivan!"

The outburst sent Jaina back a step, and with a glance to Sylvanas, even the Banshee Queen seemed alarmed by the sudden explosion of raw emotion.

"It's not just the quel'dorei that follow me that give into the void, Jaina, you're right. I feel the pull too. Every moment I spend with Alleria, I can feel the whispers scratching at the back of my skull like -" Vereesa snarled, cutting off her words. She threw herself into a pacing rhythm, trying to burn off her temper. Alleria must have taught her that.

Sylvanas said nothing for a while as she watched her younger sister stalk back and forth. "Her only other option is to embrace the light along with the rest of Silvermoon, and that would remove her from Alleria entirely."

"And you think undeath is the solution?"

Sylvanas turned that burning gaze onto Jaina. "You have no idea what I'm thinking, nor should you presume to, Lord Admiral."

Jaina disagreed. This wasn't the time, though. Vereesa needed to be talked out of her plan, but Jaina had nothing to offer in exchange.

Except…

"I have resistance to the whispers." Jaina piped up. Both Windrunners looked her way. "After - uh - after what happened, I worked with Swiftarrow, and we noticed that I'd picked up - like scar tissue?" She was running on straight theory here, pulling scraps of a story from a few conversations and hypothesis. "It's why I was chosen to bring the Tidesage scrolls for comparison - I was trained by them when I was a little girl, and whatever Swiftarrow did seemed to reinforce it."

She lifted her staff. "Plus, there's the essence of the Thunder King, and we've seen that the Keepers are resilient to the corruption. I'm not - I'm not saying I'm immune - " she tried to get her words out before Vereesa could speak, " - but if you need information here, then I have a better chance of sifting through it and clearing it before sending it off to you."

"So, what, I go back and do nothing?"

"No! You go back and find our connections from other ancient sites; any that the Requilary knows about - and that have been cleared for actual study. You're excellent at piecing together puzzles, Vereesa, we'd need your eyes for the bigger picture."

Vereesa didn't look convinced, and Sylvanas looked, well, it was near impossible to read any of the undead elf's expressions beyond anger, annoyance, and sheer boredom. Sylvanas' ears didn't fidget like those of a living elf, and while Jaina couldn't understand the finer points of elven kinesics, it still cast a further veil over the Banshee Queen's motives. Neither of the sisters had interrupted her, yet, so she continued.

"Plus, if you stay here, Alleria will find a way to show up - and there goes the secret."

Vereesa rolled her eyes, "Alleria meddles too much."

"She's the big sister, it's what they do." Jaina smiled.

Vereesa spun on a heel, and the three walked back into the soft sunshine. That stillness remained. No birdsong, no gentle whistle of the wind through the overgrowth, just an unnatural quiet that left Jaina's nerves on edge. "Fine. I'll give your option until Winter's Veil, and if there's no progress then, Jaina," she took a step toward the mage, "you let me do this my way."

"Three months is hardly enough time to solve a mystery such as -"

"I said 'no progress,'" Vereesa pointed out.

Jaina bit her tongue. She wouldn't get a better deal, and she was pretty sure that by the end of three months, either Alleria would have convinced Vereesa to not consign her life to the grave, or Jaina would have some leverage over Sylvanas that she could push back the death of her closest friend.

An hour later and Vereesa had saddled and prepared Gallant for her own long trip back to the boundary, though she wouldn't have to work her way down through the mountains themselves. Jaina had taken the hour to prepare a homing teleport for Vereesa that would have her arrive on Krasus' Landing. It was one of the basics of transmutation that every apprentice learned.

She didn't know if the sisters took the hour to themselves, and she told herself she didn't care. It was just now dawning on her that she'd agreed to spend at least three months in the presence of a woman that she loathed.

Jaina went to see Vereesa off and wasn't surprised (or happy) to notice that Sylvanas had joined her. The goodbye was terse, but Vereesa still exchanged one final hug with Jaina before she mounted up.

Vereesa didn't hug Sylvanas, but she hesitated as her courser walked past where her older sister stood. Jaina stood quietly as Vereesa's hand reached out to touch Sylvanas' shoulder before the high elf thought better of her actions and urged the courser into a brisk trot.

When Vereesa disappeared into the forest, Jaina turned on a heel toward the small alcove she'd discovered during the hour alone. It was large enough for Scout to have a shelter from the elements and had a small partitioned-off section that she could easily turn into a space for herself for the coming months.

She was in the middle of unloading the few things she'd brought off of Scout when a shadow darkened the entrance. "Well, now, I'm impressed Proudmoore."

Jaina whirled about. "What are you doing here?"

"I was wondering if you would last longer than five minutes after my sister left. I see I was wrong." Sylvanas remained at the entrance, backlit by the outdoors, so all that Jaina could make out was the crimson gleam of her eyes.

"What are you talking about?" Jaina closed the flap on Scout's saddlebag.

"You're not galavanting off after Vereesa. You succeeded, haven't you? Wrested her away from her dreadful sister?"

"I like to keep my promises."

"Mm." Sylvanas' gaze roamed over the space Jaina had acquired for herself. "Do you also like sleeping in an impromptu stable? I mean - I knew Kul Tirans thought fondly of their horses but this?" She gestured, "it seems a bit excessive."

"And where am I supposed to sleep?"

"This is an abandoned city, there are plenty of open spaces that you could commander for yourself that might actually allow you to survive until Winter's Veil if you plan on staying here that long." Sylvanas stepped back. "Grab your things."

Jaina remained where she was. When Sylvanas realized she hadn't followed, the Banshee Queen stopped and turned her head slightly to the side.

"Would you like to sleep in a makeshift stable? If that's your preference, I'll leave you to it."

Jaina growled. She cast a lightening charm on the saddle-bag and set it on her shoulder. She picked up her staff with her other hand and walked out to meet Sylvanas. "After you, I suppose."

Sylvanas nodded and strode off towards a small, short spire that was half-devoured by a massive tree that curled around the masonwork like they'd come into existence at the same exact moment. Inside, the structure was dark and smelled of centuries of abandonment, but it felt a few degrees warmer than standing out in the open - and didn't have the smell of horse.

Sylvanas stopped so suddenly just past the door that Jaina nearly stumbled into her back. The undead elf spread an arm out to encompass the space. "This is yours to do whatever you wish. I will respect whatever privacy you place upon it."

"In exchange for what?" Jaina wondered as she began to piece together a picture of what her temporary home was going to look like. It was far enough away from the desolate temple that the whispers weren't hiding in the background silence.

Sylvanas turned and pointed a finger towards one of the other spires. It also seemed to have been built around a growing tree, coiling like a creeper vine around the trunk until the final result looked much like a snake poised to strike. "I know mages are a curious lot, but please, try to restrain those urges. You have the entire city to wander but that western spire. Am I clear?"

Jaina shrugged. "Sure, I understand." She didn't want further unnecessary contact with the Banshee Queen any more than it appeared Sylvanas wanted with her. "Stay out of the Western Spire."

Even with the promise, Jaina couldn't help but stare at that serpentine tower until long after Sylvanas had disappeared.


	6. Chapter 6

Jaina took the rest of that first day to acquaint herself to Falor'Thalas. As she wandered through the wreckage of the elven cityscape, she regretted having to send Vereesa away. The youngest Windrunner would have happily spent years here just uncovering the mysteries of the past. Well, once Jaina solved the dilemma of the Banshee Queen, she'd make it up to Vereesa. Somehow.

The upper floor of the spire was enclosed and dark. There were no windows that looked out over the rest of Falor'Thalas, but that suited Jaina just fine. At the back, she found a ruined doorway that went out into a shattered outside walk that was less stone and more branch. She walked the length of it, taking in the nature around her while she mentally mapped the perimeter of her new sanctum. When she ducked back inside, it was with a keen awareness of the boundaries she would require to feel comfortable.

Jaina's first act was the establishment of the warding, defensive runes, and arcane tripwires that would reveal any movement or intruding specters that she wouldn't be first aware of. After she spelled the apparent points of entry, Jaina committed two hours to ensure there were no less-obvious routes in. Without windows, the only source of light came from the two archways outside. Good, that assisted her as she roamed the space with her staff emitting a pale glow to highlight any offset or hidden tricks in the architecture.

Jaina found none, but she wasn't convinced. The stone was covered in imperfections. Long grooves that scrawled in random ways and cast moving, disorientating shadows as the staff's light passed over them.

Jaina tilted her head to study the high points of the sanctum. Now, how to get some light? She wasn't a bat, after all. Or a brooding, murderous banshee.

Crystals were set in place along the high branches; the dust and grime that covered them evident from where she stood. If the ancient quel'dorei were anything like their descendants, it would only take the barest hint of arcane will to set them alight.

Jaina raised her staff, then paused as a horrible thought washed over her. This would be a good use of that strange incorporeal state Sylvanas could shift into. Just ask the deposed queen to pop up there with a rag -

She snorted, then looked about to make sure she was alone still.

But it gave her an idea. She went to the saddlebags and searched in them for one of her old cloaks. It'd been weather-beaten and worn before she'd arrived in Dalaran, but she kept promising herself that she'd restore it. She never would. She cut off sections of it, then with a touch of enchantment she'd picked up from the quel'dorei she'd once roomed with, and she had a small army of cloth carefully restoring the crystals' shine.

Then, as the cloth worked, she went to unpack. The busy work kept her hands and her mind occupied past the point of idle thinking. There was too much to do, and too little time. Three months? She should have pressed Vereesa for longer - until the Lunar Festival, surely.

Jaina had not only the larger dilemma of saving her friend's soul from undeath but simpler needs. A place to work, a place to sleep. She needed basic facilities for hygiene and food. Glancing through, she had enough rations for half a month, and if genuinely desperate, she could conjure up the sticky mana-buns that were far too sweet for her own good.

She took her time in establishing the second ring of wards. The intricate design would keep out any hands but her own, and blur the words for any sight but hers. Still, just to be safe, there were a few nasty surprises.

By the time she finished, she had realized two things. One, she was hungry. Two, the sanctum moved around her.

Her head snapped up. All around her, the glinting light from the crystals danced along the carved walls, teasing an illusion of motion. Strong, sure lines flowed from the natural trunk of the tree and stretched wide fingers over the stone. More of the beautiful carvings spiraled and weaved in a pattern that shifted underneath her gaze.

Underneath the crystals, Jaina found herself in the middle of a canopy.

It took her breath away.

Jaina turned on the spot, her eyes darting from shadow to shadow. She knew the trick, she knew why the stone seemed to breathe like a gentle breeze rustled along it, but she couldn't break the illusion itself. Her mind refused to accept the logical and only saw the whimsical.

She didn't know how long she stood there watching the light play, but when she finally stepped away, she felt a little piece of the calming scene stay with her.

Jaina left the sanctum. The stillness of the city remained around her and felt like she'd left the breathing world for a painting. She canted her head for noise - anything that would suggest she wasn't alone here. Nothing. Not even the softest hush of wind.

Her pace quickened as she returned to where she'd left Scout. She didn't see her in the stall until Scout let out a massive sigh and shifted from one forehoof to the other. "There you are."

Scout's ears pricked forward and one eye cracked open to focus on Jaina. She wickered in response, then stepped out to give Jaina a fond nuzzle.

"Wha-hey, no!" Jaina laughed as Scout stuck her muzzle against Jaina's cheek and then lipped at her braid playfully. "That is not - hey!"

Her laughter rang out as she suddenly found herself in a game of keep-away with the mare. Scout rounded on her, gaze directed forward as she danced about to try and pluck Jaina's braid from her shoulder.

Suddenly, the mare wheeled about. Scout snorted, pranced sideways and whipped her head around to stare intently at the space between two columns. Jaina slowed her movements - as to not startle the mare further - and tried to spy what caused the sudden nerves.

She found nothing amiss; however, the playful mood was gone.

"Easy girl, easy," Jaina set a gentle touch on the reins and coaxed Scout into a gentle trot to work out the mare's nerves. As Scout went about her, Jaina lowered her voice, lowered her hands, and spoke in a slow manner until Scout paced herself to a casual walk. "There you go."

With Scout unlikely to bolt, Jaina's mind turned to other aspects of her new situation; namely: water and hygiene. This was a city, and most cities only endured with a source of sustainable water nearby.

When the afternoon started to shimmer into early evening, Jaina had secured the basics for her, and for Scout as well. She'd found a fountain that still bubbled forth clear water, probably from some underground river. There was plenty of wild grasses and flowers for Scout to graze on. Jaina's sanctum was perhaps a ten-minute walk away from the crumbled temple. Everything she needed was could be found just moments off the open courtyard.

That bothered her, though she couldn't figure out why.

Over the next week, Jaina progressed little in her promise to Vereesa. In fact, she had yet to even approach the temple and the dark chasm underneath it. Instead, she devoted time to the Tidesage scrolls that weren't scrawled with dark teachings, but the gentle flow of the original lessons Jaina remembered from a childhood spent in the sand.

The ocean was too far to sing to, but the underground river rumbled when Jaina sent curious, tentative queries down through the rock and soil. She told herself it was practice, not avoidance.

She didn't tell herself to listen to that little voice that called it what it really was: avoidance. Fear. The ugly anxiety that crawled up her throat when she even thought a moment about those whispers slinking just underneath her own inner thoughts.

Tonight was no different. Jaina dozed underneath the shadow-play of the canopy when a noise startled her. She bolted up, neck protesting the sudden change in position.

What had …?

Thump.

The soft clatter of ice.

The Staff of Antonious flared awake next to her. The icy glow pushed against the gleam of the crystals above. Strange shadows darted as Jaina pushed to her feet and carefully picked along the floor to the archway.

Ice glittered on her fingertips. She walked with her staff forward, a powerful winter's blast brimming at the point.

"You weren't at the excavation," Sylvanas commented while brushing off the broken fragments of a frost nova off her boots. She lifted her gaze and eyed the two primed spells with a curious cant of her head. "I came to see what the hold-up was."

"You said you'd never come here," Jaina allowed the winter's blast to dissipate into a soft, cold breeze, but her fingers still crackled with the promise of ice.

"Perhaps my Common is rusty - I was referring to your little cage. The rest of the city is free-range for the both of us."

Jaina rested her staff on the floor. "What do you want, Banshee?"

Sylvanas quirked a brow at the title. "Why, Lord Admiral, allow me to repeat myself," her voice slowed to a careful pace, like one would speak to a babe still in swaddling cloth; "you were not at the excavation, doing what you've promised my sister you'd be doing, so I came to see what's causing the delay."

Jaina's entire arm went numb from the frost. Her staff was hot, almost burning to touch. Every inch of her shifted with the sudden surge of arcane need to slam the banshee off the entrance dais.

Seconds passed. Jaina released the spell into the wards. They flared a bright blue as they drank the energy. Sylvanas remained where she stood.

"I'm not delaying anything," Jaina said.

Sylvanas scoffed. "Please, it already costs me enough of my willpower to tolerate you while you're playing Vereesa's game - I don't need to have to sort through your lies as well."

"I'm not lying! Magical knowledge is more than just charging blindly into the unknown and hoping for answers. I'm preparing -"

"Nothing. You leave your cage only to fetch water and to tend to your hygiene -"

"How do you …?"

Sylvanas twitched a hand signal, and Jaina watched three slender, elven women appear from the long stretches of empty space around them. They dressed much like the banshee herself, in practical dark leather and mail uniforms that allowed for quick, subtle movements. Their hoods were pulled up, but that didn't disguise the soft shimmer of red eyes that stared out from underneath.

Huh. Not all of the Dark Rangers had been lost at the Battle for Silvermoon. Jaina wondered why that surprised her.

The trio of rangers lurked on the far side of the courtyard.

"You're spying on me?" Jaina turned that on Sylvanas.

"I'm keeping an eye on an unwelcome guest," Sylvanas corrected, as she inspected her fingernails, her voice lulling into that bored drawl. "Have you ever stumbled across a rat aboard one of your ships during a voyage, Lord Admiral?" The question sounded innocuous, but as Sylvanas continued to speak, malice slithered into her words. "At first, your instinct is to kill it and toss the vermin overboard - but then you realize that such action is far too brash. You'll just teach the others (because there's always more rats) how to better avoid capture. You could -" she peered over her shoulder to the dark rangers, "release the cats and hope they cull the nest - but we both know you're smarter than that, no? You need to be confident you know exactly where they're feeding, sleeping, and breeding." Sylvanas' gaze returned to meet Jaina's own. "Only then can you be certain you'll destroy every last trace of the pest."

Jaina couldn't help it. She took a step back behind the wards.

That put a vicious smirk across Sylvanas' lips. The banshee lowered her hand, and her smirk turned blithe. "I know where you feed, where you sleep, and, well, I'm not certain I care to know where you breed - but out of all of my observations I know that you aren't doing your job."

"What does that matter to you?" Jaina shot back. "If I spend the months here doing absolutely nothing, then when Vereesa returns she'll just jump right into the grave alongside you -"

Sylvanas lunged forward and snarled as the wards snapped awake. The brilliant scrawled runes revealed every inch of the grotesque twist of the banshee's power. The way her skin pulled taut over her bones, and cracks snaked along the line of her jaw like withered hide. That crimson gaze burned within the banshee's features, a hellfire that threatened to swallow Jaina's soul.

Jaina stood rigid as the barrier held. She hoped the barrier held. She prayed to some distant god that the barrier held.

Sylvanas stepped back. The fingers of her gloves were charred, and her expression smoothed back to the unbroken, beautiful mask. She composed herself; rolled her neck left, then right, then fixed that lying, placid gaze back on Jaina.

"Heed the lesson of the ship well, Lord Admiral: If the rat cannot point me towards the nest, then it's useless to me. You have three nights to prove you are any different."

"Or else?"

No answer. Sylvanas stalked into the gloom beyond the ward-light. After a while, the dark rangers followed.

Jaina waited longer until her heart stopped pounding against her rib cage. Until her breath wasn't jagged and her nerves snapping like wildfire at the slightest thing.

It was only when she felt safe enough to take her eyes off the darkness that she heard another noise. A shuffling gait, cautious and light.

A small, wiry forsaken came into view of the ward-light. Dressed in ragged scraps of cloth, it was impossible to distinguish any identifying marks about them beyond the pale yellow of their eyes as they blinked against the harsh gleam of the arcane. They carried something on a pallet-litter behind them and stopped well beyond the entrance dais itself.

"Lor-Lord Admiral?" Their voice was a whisper, and just barely at that. As they stepped closer, Jaina could see why: what was once a throat was now shredded flesh long desiccated. Air escaped the wreckage of their throat long before their mouth could form the words.

"Yes?" Jaina snapped.

The forsaken shrunk back, dropping the pallet's rope. They froze in place for a moment before they picked it back up.

They were afraid of her. The barest twinge of guilt touched Jaina before she threw it off. Good. Let them be afraid.

"What do you want?"

The forsaken walked about the pallet and pushed it up and on the dais itself. Once it was close enough for Jaina to step out and grab should she wish, the forsaken broke into a scurry back into the safety of the night.

Jaina waited again. Any more surprises waiting to spring out from the dark? She listened and heard only the rustle of Scout settling in for the night.

When she went past the wards, she expected an attack. None came, but she still snatched and dragged the surprisingly heavy pallet back through the boundary.

"Stupid, stupid, stupid…" she muttered. She caught her breath while she took the time to look over what had been left for her.

The pallet was covered by one of the old Undercity banners - the pale mask with the arrows over a rich purple fabric. Lordaeron's catacombs had been untouched for six years by now, but the tapestry was well-cared for. The material was thick due to needing to handle inclement weather, and while Jaina's first instinct was to burn it - she stopped herself.

Lordaeron's winters were harsh thanks to the cold northern winds coming off the coast. Jaina remembered many a night bundling herself in triple layers to stave off the bitter frost even with a raging fire in her room's hearth. Jaina had no misconceptions that the encroaching winter in Lordaeron's mountains wouldn't be any less of a miserable frostbitten experience.

And her with no hearth to allow a fire to rage in, either.

She fingered the fabric. She wanted to rip it - it could serve as a curtain to block out the wind that stole through the arches, but the fact that the tapestry was still intact and vibrant stopped her. Someone cared for it - and she couldn't be sure it was Sylvanas herself. Probably wasn't Sylvanas herself.

What did that matter? So there were still forsaken that weren't the subject of hunting missions or tucked away in the locked cloisters waiting for their penance before the Light - what did that matter to Jaina? Why should it matter to Jaina?

The forsaken had been the most zealous of the Horde underneath Sylvanas' leadership. They'd led the assassinations, the poisonings, the sabotage and terrorism missions that left plenty of Alliance settlements in disarray. In every veteran, Jaina knew she could find the scars of what the forsaken had done.

Yet …

Jaina crumpled the tapestry in her grip; relished the crinkle against her palms.

The promise of fire licked against her fingers. She'd just need to …

No.

Jaina set the tapestry aside.

Upstairs, there was a spot hollowed out within the tree that she'd been using as a makeshift bed. Warmth was warmth, and as long as Jaina made sure to fold the banner so the forsaken sigil wasn't visible, she'd have more than just her cloak and a light travel blanket to sleep under.

Jaina swallowed a heavy sigh and set the tapestry back on the pallet. She cast one last look into the night - then brought the unwelcome but needed gift upstairs.

Sleep never came to Jaina as easily as others claimed for themselves. Since she'd left the lull of Kul Tiras' shores behind to start her studies in Dalaran, it took Jaina longer to find rest in oblivion, and even harder for her to stay there.

She believed she'd find peace for a second time on Theramore Isle after the Battle for Mount Hyjal, and she had, for a while. The busy work of establishing a new home for her newfound people kept the restlessness at bay.

That shattered, of course, when she'd played the fatal role in the death of her father. She'd shut the windows of her tower at night when the winds howled just a little louder, or thunder rumbled on the distant horizon.

After the mana-bomb …

Her dreams were now unquiet, taunting ambushes that snatched her the moment she drifted off. There would be snippets of scorched flesh, the taste of ash in the air around her. There was the roar of a tidal wave that strained underneath her hands. The screams of the survivors. Her own throat scraped raw from sobbing.

Swiftarrow's tincture had held them off, but nothing lasts forever.

So, it came to be, after another week that Jaina found herself wandering the sky paths between the various spires as another afternoon bled from gold to the blue of nautical twilight.

She told herself it wasn't because of Sylvanas' veiled threats, or the reality that she actually wasn't alone, but Jaina had finally broached close enough to the chasm that she'd managed to scribble down a few stanzas before she'd retreated.

It had taken a night of flipping through the scrolls and abysmal collection of books she had: three - with none being a book on translation before she came to the frustrating conclusion that Vereesa would have been the ideal candidate to explore the ruins. Vereesa, who knew Thalassian in all its dialects. Vereesa, who actually had a passion and the ability to delve into the buried past. Vereesa, who was far too good a friend for Jaina to let down.

The morning arrived with Jaina sending off an arcane-constructed bird with a letter meant for the youngest Windrunner. In it were the glyphs and Jaina's first theories, along with an unsure attempt to try and apologize. The construct lasted probably an hour before she felt the magic collapse.

Curious. She'd drafted another letter - this one with a more certain message in it.

It lasted an hour and a half. Jaina measured the time precisely.

The third missive, she set a small scrying spell upon the construct, then set it loose. When the spell collapsed, Jaina was able to see the final moments. She cursed when she noticed the arrow that struck true through the centerpiece of the animating rune.

Of course, she couldn't see the archer themselves.

She would need another night to craft more of the runes required to animate the constructs, so chalked it up to a learning curve. Not to mention, she believed she had a substantial lead as to what could be underneath the temple - she'd send out another letter when she had more to her idea, and she'd first checked for any stray dark rangers.

With the knowledge that Falor'Thalas housed the few remaining survivors of the forsaken, Jaina took to the stillness a little easier. The lack of noise, of shuffling movement and quiet breath, was expected when one was close by to the dead. It didn't completely remove her nerves, after all, now she kept one eye out for a glimpse of her neighbors and the local watch.

Once every few days, she did spy one of the rangers. They prowled the high spaces, slunk through the canopy and overgrowth, and kept their bows and sights set outward. And it was even rarer, but Jaina began to pick up where the forsaken would frequent. They stayed close to the central portions of the city, near to the Western Spire, but they were there.

And they … left gifts. Often.

At first, it bothered Jaina, but after a gift of freshly cured and tanned deer hides that were supple enough that they felt like butter underneath her touch - she came to appreciate the little touches. There would be offerings of wild berries left along the ward during the morning, or once she'd found a set of tempered ceramics that could carry water to and from where she slept.

Yet she didn't understand why.

The forsaken clearly listened to and followed Sylvanas' leadership still, so why bother with the tiny gifts? Especially when, on the morning of the fourth week of her stay, Jaina felt the dissolution of not just the decoy missive-construct, but the actual one.

This time, she'd followed the constructs and watched, in the open, as one of the patrolling dark rangers stir from her seemingly idly pose to send a casual arrow loose directly through the construct itself.

That's it.

She scooped up the letter itself, sent a rude gesture to the dark ranger who merely tipped her head and went about her duties, and then set off on an entirely foolish errand: hunting down the Banshee Queen herself.

She checked the inner courts first and spent an awfully long moment debating on storming the Western Spire itself when she just turned on a heel and went back to her sanctum.

It took another night, but she ambushed the next forsaken to leave a small offering. This one was a tiny slip of a thing, and only because Jaina didn't want to face the horrible implications of children suffering through undeath, she attributed the forsaken's size and stature to a loss of muscle and body fat as the years took their toll on the undead.

"Where's the Banshee?" Jaina prowled in a half-circle around the poor thing caught in her adjusted frost nova. "Where does she lurk?"

The forsaken struggled against the ice, eyes wide and gift long-dropped on the floor. They caught and dropped Jaina's gaze again and again like they wanted to tell her but couldn't. Wouldn't?

Jaina closed the distance, struggled to keep her demeanor calm. "I just want to speak with her."

The forsaken shook their head, opened their mouth to plead and Jaina saw they had no tongue with each to speak before they snapped their jaw shut and stared down, forlornly at the ice.

"I - damn it."

Jaina released the spell. Her lead disappeared as quick as a rabbit escaping an improperly set snare.

Movement from above. One of the dark rangers knelt down on the pathway, head cocked at a strange angle as she observed. Jaina likened her to a rather ugly owl.

"The Dark Lady will see you if only so you can stop harassing her people."

"I'm not harassing - " Jaina hustled to keep up with the sudden burst of speed the ranger gained. "I'm not harassing anyone, I just need to speak with her."

The dark ranger led her away from the inner sanctums and courtyards and out along the space where nature had all but reclaimed the forest. The stone buildings and monuments were little more than dust underneath the overgrowth itself. Vines tangled themselves around column and trunk alike, and wide-petaled dark flowers bloomed to give the night air a strange, sweet aftertaste.

Then came the scent of a campfire. The crackle of flames sounded unfamiliar to Jaina after a month of quiet, and it was curiosity that pushed her the rest of the way.

She stepped into a moss-stone covered alcove exposed to the wind, the sky, and the forest around it. In the middle, a respectable fire burned in a brazier and sent spirals of cedar-smoke up against the stars above. Jaina visited the blacksmith and armorer in Theramore to recognize the tools one would need to tan hides, and could make out past the smoke, an impressively-sized stag hung upside-down from a nearby tree.

Perched near the bottom of an overturned pillar, Sylvanas straddled the marble as she dragged a sickle down along a hide - wolf - if Jaina took a wild guess from the sheer size alone.

Huh. So, the hides were not from the dark rangers? That was information Jaina didn't know how to process.

Neither was the fact that Sylvanas was sans most of her outer armor. Fleshing a hide was a messy business so Jaina could understand the reason behind the banshee's choice, but to actually see it?

Now, Jaina couldn't name the muscles, but to watch as they flexed while Sylvanas stripped the bear hide of gristle made her wish she'd taken a class or two in anatomy just so she could name the triangle that bunched against Sylvanas' shoulder and that strong line that surged with each forward push of the blade.

She should have expected a former archer to have a powerful frame. And her staring? Probably the shock of the banshee having whole, unblemished skin unlike the forsaken Jaina had been near in the past.

With the firelight, Jaina couldn't even make out the gray pallor of undeath. For a heartstopping moment, Sylvanas was alive under her gaze. All that was missing was a layer of sweat.

"Can I ask why you're tormenting my people or do I need to wait for you to remember how to speak?"

Jaina shook her head hard. Sylvanas hadn't paused in her work but had turned to peer at Jaina over her shoulder.

"Why are your rangers shooting down my missives?" Jaina launched right into it.

"To ensure you're not giving away our location. It's simple security measures."

"They've given you every single one, so you know they're not incriminating in any way!"

"They could be spelled." Sylvanas returned to her work.

"There is not a drop of arcane on them!" Jaina stepped into the firelight and relished the warmth that came with the movement.

"How can I be certain the spell doesn't dissolve as soon as the construct is destroyed?" Sylvanas flicked grime off the blade, wiped it clean along a strip of cloth.

This was absolute petty bullshit. "If you wore a bell, I could find you and ensure that you're comfortable with the message before I sent them off."

Sylvanas shrugged. "No need, just place them in a secure spot outside your cage. Kalira will see they're delivered to me."

"Fine. Have your power-play. I don't care." This was one of those battles Jaina would have to lose to win the war.

"I'm glad you see it my way; if that's all?"

Jaina heard the dark ranger approaching from behind and took another step closer to the fire. She rounded it until she found a spot she could sit and observe the banshee queen without having her back exposed to creeping dark rangers or large bears or anything else.

"The hides aren't cut for armor padding, or to turn into gloves or boots. They're full, why? I know they're not second-hand gifts from the forsaken."

The fleshing slowed. Sylvanas took her time wiping the blade clean. "I'm sure you understand by now that I do not care if you manage to make progress, or if you fail miserably, Lord Admiral -"

"That's not what I asked."

" - sooner or later, you will find that this branch of theory that my sister has come up with is ultimately futile and that there is only one inevitability that remains for her family to return to the wholesome unity she so desires to have." Sylvanas turned, twisting, so she faced Jaina as she spoke.

"In two months, you will have progress or you won't. If you stay - another month, a season, a year - it doesn't matter. What does matter to me, Lord Admiral, is that my sister seems to find you interesting? Like a pet cat, I suppose. I cannot lie and say I see what appeals about you - but Vereesa's always enjoyed the strange quirks of the other races."

Jaina growled under her breath.

"So, like a favorite pet, I suppose I'm stuck babysitting until Vereesa comes to take you home. Or you slip the leash. I'm hoping for the latter - and soon; caring for all your living needs is exhausting."

"I guess even three years of sycophants would make even you miss the sound of your own voice, wouldn't it?" Jaina snapped back. "You've had no one to preen for - I should feel honored, but your superiority complex wore out a decade ago." Jaina leaned back on her elbows and soaked in the fire's warmth even as she glared daggers at the banshee. "I don't care if it takes me ten years, if there's any credence to Vereesa's theory, I'll spend every single day right here until we solve it. Then you can have your city of the dead all to yourself. Just as you want it."

Sylvanas went quiet, but not still. The banshee carefully set the blade down and rose from her perch to cross the space between her and Jaina. The firelight flickered over her body, highlighting the soft shadow of her breasts, running along the hard line of her stomach. She wore her nudity like it was a crown and came to sit next to Jaina like they were old friends sharing a simple fireside chat.

When she leaned in, Jaina could smell the cedar-smoke in her hair and see flecks of gold within a dancing crimson gaze. Jaina stiffened, but Sylvanas kept a few inches between their bodies.

When she leaned in, Sylvanas whispered like she was sharing a schoolyard secret. "How does it feel, Lord Admiral, that no matter who's right - Vereesa, or myself - that you're just a means to our end?"

Jaina's heart stuttered. It meant nothing but damned if that didn't hurt. Sylvanas was lying. Vereesa didn't - no. No. She wouldn't let the banshee get the upper hand. Before she could speak, though, Sylvanas was already pulling away to stand. She paused a moment before she fully straightened.

"When you write your next letter to my sister, try not to grovel for forgiveness so much. You're trying to convince her you're actually capable of being useful. Enjoy your night."

Sylvanas flicked a hand.

A cold grip curled around Jaina's shoulder as the nameless dark ranger hauled her up to her feet. As she was led away from the fire, she could only watch as Sylvanas reclaimed her perch, picked up the fleshing blade, and resumed her work.


	7. Chapter 7

Jaina was wrong.

The dark rangers were not owls that she spied on a rare evening when the light cast along the upper paths just right. No, they were vultures. Nasty, skulking creatures that lurked in her shadow and announced her movement to the waiting predators below.

For that's what Sylvanas had become after their fireside chat. Somewhere after that night, the banshee decided that she'd grown tired of avoidance. Now she appeared on the edge of Jaina's vision. The banshee would stand still as a statue until the opportunity to startle Jaina's heart into her throat presented itself, then she'd disappear only to repeat the fright at a later date.

The gifts still arrived, and a week after Sylvanas strutted around the fire to perch next to Jaina, the mute forsaken Jaina had attempted to catch with her frost nova had returned to the Sanctum to present a fine-tailored wolf-furred cloak. It was from one of the large silver-furred beasts that prowled the northern forests.

Jaina remembered the annual hunt during late autumn to cull them in an effort to prevent starving packs from risking ventures down into the lowland valleys to pick away at the crowded livestock in pens, or at the occasional unlucky villager.

At first, her hands twisted around the desire to ignite the cloak - but much like the tapestry, she resisted the tug of her destructive desire. Not that she believed the forsaken themselves were behind this.

No, this was purely an act from the banshee herself. An act that Jaina wasn't certain would backfire onto the forsaken if she rose to the bait. Then again, would she care?

She wound up setting the cloak aside in the upper tier of the sanctum, along with several other "gifts" that she believed came directly from the banshee. A well-sharpened dagger with an antlered handle that hummed with a gentle magic along it. A salve tucked away in a small, painted jar that she didn't trust to open. A leather pack that was lighter than the saddle bag and rested easier on her shoulders.

Separate, they were each fine gifts. They all displayed an art of craftsmanship one expected from an elf who had spent hundreds of years as a ranger.

Together, though, they painted a rather pointed message. A message that Jaina tossed at the feet of the very banshee bothering her the very next day.

Sylvanas was as still as the statues she lounged against. The only clue that she wasn't the gargoyle she mimicked was the gentle sway of a leg casually dangling over the side of the upper-spire she perched on. She angled her attention down to the package dumped, and merely quirked a brow. "What's all this?"

"It's your idea of a joke, you tell me."

"I assure you, my sense of humor died when I did the first time. I'm afraid you'll have to explain the punchline." Sylvanas lifted her gaze up and away into the canopy.

"A warm cloak. A dagger. A travel pack. A salve that may or may not rot through my skin."

"And?"

"I'm not leaving. We had this conversation already."

Sylvanas nodded, and her attention dropped back over Jaina once again. "Yes, I do remember you nattering on about some sort of noble endeavor to stay on regardless of personal cost, your duties, or any other random trifle that humans need to accomplish within the blink of their lifetime."

Jaina took a steadying breath. "You can have them back."

"I don't need them. Though, Vereesa mentioned that the caverns beneath the temple held an unnatural chill in their labyrinth," Sylvanas peeled herself from her vantage point as Jaina turned on a heel to stalk off and away. "I thought humans liked gifts!"

"Insufferable banshee…" Jaina muttered.

Jaina never traveled with the Explorer's League much. Theramore and the complex political knots that prevented an outburst of violence between her nation and the bloodthirst of her northern neighbors took up enough of her time that she had only experienced the finer details of archeology and field research through the exploits of the adventurers and mercenaries that ducked in and out of Theramore on a daily basis.

Before that, there were the rare field outings with the other apprentices as their mentors taught them how to recognize the silent, secret symbols of the arcane world around them. Antonious himself used the remains of the Alteraci prison camp that held Dalaran captives to educate Jaina further - how to establish and how to break through such seals and symbols without alerting others to her presence.

Jaina used that knowledge now as she took the first steps into the gloom. A pale orb of arcane light danced around her shoulders to assist her vision as she descended past the first layer of crumbled rock and rotted wood.

Armed with several sheets of parchment and an enchanted quill, Jaina began the arduous journey of detailing the first eye-witness encounter for Vereesa.

The elven influence went soil-deep. Further into the, well, best descriptor would be catacombs, and the architecture became a bizarre blend of early quel'dorei aesthetics imposed over an already-established culture.

Troll, Jaina's fairly sure, but she didn't know the exact tribe. The Zandalari chroniclers would have known, but … well. That was a bridge that could never be crossed again.

Jaina hummed an old Stormsong melody taught to the youngest Tidesages as she sketched. The notes rang through the earth and reverberated within the easy current of that underground river. A serviceable distraction to drown out the whispers that snaked through the ancient stone.

It wasn't perfect though.

A mistimed opening, a breath that paused the melody, anything that interrupted the harmony and a discordant note slipped into the song.

The voices - the whispers were different than the cacophony that assaulted her in the Violet Hold. These were soft, subtle pleas that slipped into her thoughts like droplets of rain.

One moment, she reflected on the light needed to sketch a bas-relief she settled before; the next, she found herself up and moving.

Her hands are empty but stained with ink.

Behind her, the sketch is ruined. A spiraled glyph is repeated over and over on the parchment, the ink seeping through to stain the papers beneath it.

Jaina's breath arrived in a fog. The air around her was cold. She inhaled and her teeth clattered as a nasty shiver stole through her. She worked her fingers and they ached and protested the motion, like she'd gone out in winter without gloves on.

Where … were her gloves?

She stared down at her bare hands, knuckles white and tips tinged blue.

She found her gloves near the bas-relief she originally aimed to sketch. They were discarded haphazardly, and Jaina saw ink on the stone itself, dried to the touch.

"How long…?"

 _How long, how long, how long?_ Her question bounced down the dark hallways and chased her out of the excavation itself.

Autumn came with the crisping of the leaves. Drops of red and orange splashed onto the verdant canopy until the crown of the old oak and pine was decorated in the golds and crimson of the harvest. Where the world still turned with the seasons, cider would become the favored drink, and the fruits of the fields would be laid upon long tables for friends and family to share.

A few days after the frozen pit, Jaina went for Scout. She tacked up the mare and tried to ignore the way her fingers shook and prevented her from buckling the girth on the first, second, third try. It took a steadying pulse of the arcane to finish the job.

Jaina swung up into the saddle and encouraged Scout to make a westward pass through Falor'Thalas and the wooded outskirts. She allowed her mare free reign as the little pieces of sunlight that escaped through the canopy smoothed away the worst of her jagged nerves. She carried her sketches with her, unwilling to let that glyph out of her sight.

Her thoughts wandered as she did, and she tried to fall back into the comforting pattern of research and study to push away the unsettling feeling in her gut. She pondered the craftsmanship of the stone, the druidic spells that must have been needed to shape the trees into the designs needed to support the spires and pathways that wove through the branches above her. She tried to picture the populace of such a place - the history of flight from Mount Hyjal and the exodus through the mountains themselves.

Jaina knew little of Falor'Thalas' history, only the stories that Kael'thas had shared when they'd worked together in the Dalaran archives. The elven prince had been proud to speak of his ancestor's resilience and strength - but he spoke in myth and fables of a time thousands of years before. Nothing concrete.

And now, Jaina wondered if there were any elves left that knew more than folk legend about the ruins she wandered through.

Had Sylvanas stumbled upon this place during her flight? Or had she or another one of the Windrunner sisters already discovered the lost piece of their history and risked it's secrecy against Sylvanas' continued existence?

Questions that had no easy answers.

She returned to her sanctum with the golden light of a mountain afternoon and found Sylvanas near the lower entrance. The banshee was back in her practical armor, with her hood drawn up. The bow slung upon her back was made of a curious silver material wrapped by what she believed was cobalt and - with a soft query of magic - leystone. The design flared out from a single crest in the center that bore the phoenix of the Sunstrider house - and rippled out like cresting waves until it ended in two near-transparent points. The piece hummed with the arcane and staring at it eventually made Jaina's eyes water.

"Thori'dal?" Jaina questioned.

Sylvanas had already turned to spy her arrival, and the hood masked her expression as Jaina neared and dismounted Scout. "You have a keen eye, Lord Admiral."

"I know my magical artifacts." Jaina led her mare off to the side to groom. "Why are you here?"

Sylvanas pushed off the column she'd been leaning against and took a few steps forward. She held Jaina's latest letter to Vereesa in her hand. "Your sketches - the first one -" she unfurled a sheet from the pile. It held the image of the bas-relief. "I know this figure: a matron worshipped by a sect of Zandalari druids. There had been some ...trouble with them during an Azerite mining excavation; the Archdruid mentioned them often in his reports."

"The Horde's Archdruid, you mean."

Sylvanas paused a moment, then inclined her head.

Jaina thought briefly on the endless spiral in her pocket. "So, the highborne co-opted a loa?"

"It would seem so."

"Why?"

Sylvanas stared at her for a long stretch of silence. She was weighing a decision, and she was being, well, civil. Jaina watched her in return, trying to keep to her promise to Vereesa to try and find answers here. She worked the dust and sweat off Scout to keep herself busy. Idle hands led to aggravating the banshee, she supposed.

"Desperation, I would suspect," Sylvanas' voice reverberated through the still air. "Nordrassil's well would not have been strong enough to sustain the highborne so far away, and I suspect the first several winters without it's assistance were horrifying for the exiles." Sylvanas set the papers down carefully, her voice taking on a distant tone. "The first death to starvation would have sent a shockwave through the community."

Jaina said nothing. This Sylvanas who spoke, well, at her, without the sting of mockery was not a Sylvanas she knew how to approach, or manage. She felt as off-balanced as a greenhorn sailor, braced against the anticipatory crash of a wave she was sure would break over.

"I'd like to see the actual relief, Lord Proudmoore,"

"I -" Jaina stopped. Her fingers brushed the paper folded away in her pocket. She thought of echoes and the shimmer of pale light, and somehow knew she had more to sketch down. "All right, follow me."

"Lord Admiral?" Sylvanas called out as Jaina crossed the halfway point. The banshee stood near Scout, the mare's ears flicking nervously at the nearness of a creature she didn't understand. "Aren't you forgetting something?"

What? Jaina had her ink, quill, and extra papers stashed away in her satchel. The way down was marked with small glyphs that served as waypoints and tiny specks of light. What had she forgotten?

Sylvanas looked pointedly at the still-saddled and hitched Scout.

Oh.

Right. Jaina hurried back and apologized to the mare as she finished the groom and pulled off the saddle, the blanket, and swapped Scout's bridle for a halter instead. All while Sylvanas stood and waited nearby.

Job finished, and as chastised as a child, Jaina quickened her pace, and left it up to Sylvanas if she wanted to follow.

Down below once again.

At the precipice of the catacombs, Jaina began to hum. She walked along the corridor as the water responded with the sweetness of a babbling brook. Their duet kept her mind focused as she retraced her path back.

It wasn't far, actually.

Within a few minutes, Jaina stood before the bas-relief. Down here in the dark, the elements had not had time to wear away at the details. The bas-relief took up one section of the crowded room. A feminine figure crouched low and stared out, hungry, into the distance. Her hands were clawed, curled over the crescent that served as her hunting perch. Her features were beastial, feline and avian and strange to see upon the noble bone-structure of an elf.

Or, she thought it was an elf. There's the impression of tusks - or are those fangs exposed in a snarl?

How much -

"Incredible."

Sylvanas' voice cut through Jaina's thoughts. Cut through the song.

"When Vereesa first mentioned this place, I thought she'd been reading too many bedtime stories and yet -"

"I need to concentrate." Jaina risked a sentence.

Sylvanas broke off from her inspection. Her gaze was sharp and intrusive.

Jaina went back to her work, picking up the melody again. There was a darker undercurrent now, her unease with the banshee plucking at the notes in a strange third harmony.

She went back to the relief carving, and brought her hand up again to run her fingers - wait, had she lost her gloves or … no. No, she'd rode without them. Yes.

Sylvanas' stare was a dagger aimed directly between her shoulders that became impossible to ignore. The song wavered in her throat. Her hands twitched against the cold stone.

She stared into the subtle impressions beyond that hungry gaze and searched for the pattern hidden there.

She -

She was warm.

No.

Burning hot, actually.

Jaina sat up, and the wolf cloak fell from around her shoulders. She faced a raging fire, the flames devouring massive, broken branches. Above her, the canopy was devoid of any light save from the fire itself.

Beyond the firelight, despite the night-blind, Jaina picked out the vague shadow of movement, and a quiet Thalassian conversation being held.

The figures pulled away from each other as a dark ranger stepped around the fire holding a small bowl in her hands. When she noticed Jaina was up, she called for Sylvanas.

"The Lord Admiral's conscious."

Sylvanas arrived. With her hood pulled forward, all Jaina could see was the blaze of her eyes. In her hand, she carried the spiral sketch.

"That's mine." Jaina reached out for it. "Give it back, please."

"No," Sylvanas jerked her chin toward the dark ranger, who took it as an unspoken order to leave. "I don't think I will, Lord Admiral."

"You went through - "

"Absolutely nothing of yours. You'd gone quiet - a blessing, really, that song had begun to grow aggravating. It was only after you scraped your fingers raw that I decided to intervene and found you attempting to retrace the circle of stars."

Jaina checked her hands. Peacebloom and silverleaf, the base for any healing salve or potion, greeted her senses as she pulled back the cloth bandage around her index finger. Her fingertips were scraped raw, the exposed flesh shining against the light. The memory of pain ran down her palm and pinched up into her shoulders until she had to tuck her hand out of sight to stop herself from recreating the sensation.

She lifted her head up to meet that deadly stare, and licked her lips as she tried to grab onto anything besides the throbbing ache in her fingers. What if she couldn't trace runes or patterns? Had she crippled her spellwork? Why had she crippled herself -

"What did you mean by 'circle of stars?" She launched into the question, hoping that Sylvanas' divulging mood carried through from earlier. "Did you learn something?"

"Yes," Sylvanas folded the glyph up. For a brief span between heartbeats, Jaina's panic rose to uncomfortable heights as she swore the banshee was going to burn the sketch - only to slump back gratefully when it was placed far out of reach from any errant ember or spark. "You lied."

"I haven't lied about anything I've found."

Sylvanas snorted. "The last two letters you've sent for Vereesa, you did not mention the circle. You mention a few other details - the loa, the image of the Matron, but not the actual circle."

"I wanted to have more information before I sent her anything. That isn't a crime."

Sylvanas snatched the bowl that the dark ranger had been holding, then came to kneel next to Jaina, away from the fire. It exposed her, even despite the hood that masked most of her face. Jaina watched as the banshee worked through a rapid series of emotions before she settled on annoyance.

The banshee set the bowl down, and pulled out a wrap of clean linen cloth. Or it looked clean.

"You lied to Vereesa. You are not resistant to the Void, nor are you resistant to anything down in those tunnels." Sylvanas peeled back the wolf-cloak and gripped Jaina's wrists, dragging the wounds back out so they could be tended to. "How many times have you lost track of yourself?"

"Just the once - ow!" Jaina winced as Sylvanas removed the dressings. They were dry, and the linen stuck to the raw flesh underneath. Flecks of blood and other crusted fluids were picked away from her hands as Sylvanas scanned the bandages, then tossed them into the flame.

Sylvanas set Jaina's hands into the bowl, and Jaina felt immediate warmth, different than the campfire. It felt like she ran her fingers through liquid sunlight, through the memory of an afternoon underneath a clear sky. Sylvanas watched her as Jaina looked at her hands. Jaina glanced up once.

"Twice. I've lost track twice."

She did not mention that those were the only two times she was aware of. The moments she drifted off while pouring through the scrolls, or the blots of ink that forced her to rewrite her letters after coming back to herself didn't need to be brought up.

Sylvanas squeezed her wrists tighter. "One time is once too many."

Jaina's hands soaked in the salve-water while Sylvanas broke her grip to start unfurling pre-measured strips of linen.

"It was an accident. They happen." Jaina used the bandage-making as a buffer between her and the banshee. "How long was I out?"

"Long enough to prove your uselessness."

"Uselessness?!" Jaina almost yanked her hands out. Almost. The warmth of the numbing herb made her sluggish, because Sylvanas snatched at her wrists before she could. "If you've been reading my notes, then you know there are several theories I'm sure we could start exploring -"

"I have read your letters, I have given thought to the theories you've proposed," Sylvanas waited another minute, then dipped the linen bandages in with Jaina's hands. "I even suspect that I was wrong about the futile direction Vereesa proposed - and that you would -"

Sylvanas broke off with a furious shake of her head. She looked so much like Vereesa as frustration stole over her like a cloud. There was a furrow between her brows that broke the smooth beauty of her elven features that it offset Jaina's hatred just for a moment.

"But, you lied, as humans are want to do when they're trying to bully their way into things that do not concern them. That have never concerned them."

Sylvanas words were at odds with her actions. She berated Jaina, sneered and snarled around her supposed revelation that humans were worth nothing but pain to elvenkind; and yet she treated Jaina's hands with a gentleness that could not have been natural to the banshee.

Jaina's hands were lifted, and her fingers slowly flexed and worked through various exercises before Sylvanas wrapped them with the soaked bandages.

"I don't understand you," Jaina commented as Sylvanas neared the end of her task. "Do you want me to fail, or do you want me to succeed? No matter which end of the spectrum I fall on during any given moment, you're already halfway through taunting me about the other side of the pendulum."

"I don't need you to understand me, Lord Admiral, you won't be around long enough to even begin to try." Sylvanas let go of Jaina's hands, then ordered: "trace a cantrip."

"I have a little under two months left." Jaina reminded her even as she complied with the order. She went for a basic spell-weave, an arcane light-orb that shimmered merrily in the space between her hands. Her fingers twinged with the movement, but there was no stiffness, nor loss of motion. "Midwinter, remember?"

"Mm. At most you have a week"

"I was out for two months?!" Impossible! She couldn't have -

"I sent my own letter to Vereesa yesterday when we couldn't rouse you from your fugue. I believe she'll do the bare minimum to disguise the reason for her sudden need to leave Dalaran, but she'll arrive as fast as she can to rescue you from your own pride."

"What? No. It's at least a week's flight for even the arcane construc... " Jaina trailed off. "You have a stabilized portal."

Sylvanas waved her hand through the orb to banish the spell. "You are forbidden from going back down into the catacombs. If I, or a dark ranger spies you, we will do whatever necessary to keep you from turning into an abomination."

The banshee stood up and collected the bowl from where it rested on Jaina's lap. "The last mercy I can give my little sister is the knowledge that she won't arrive just to put you down like a rabid animal."


	8. Chapter 8

Shock rooted Jaina to the spot long enough that Sylvanas had strode back around the firepit to meet with the dark ranger from before. They spoke low, in Thalassian again. Their eyes caught the firelight every time they glanced her way, refracting red against the night.

Jaina wanted to continue the conversation. She wanted to protest against Sylvanas' sudden decision to end her part in Vereesa's plan - or protest Sylvanas' involvement entirely. The banshee had no business refusing Jaina like she was an impulsive child!

Jaina's first instinct was to return to the catacombs just to spite the orders she felt Sylvanas was currently delivering to the dark ranger, but that wouldn't be enough. She needed focus and time, and neither would be present under the pressure of hiding from a pack of rabid dark rangers.

Not for the first time since she'd arrived, anger crackled cold and bitter over her more logical thoughts. As before, she tried to remember Vereesa's plea, tried to remember the grief that'd overtaken her friend after Rhonin's death, and Jaina's vow to never, ever bring that sort of pain again.

The reminder had eased off the sharp edges of Jaina's anger before, but now? No. Now, it served as fuel. She had tried, Light damn it all, and now that she might have something to help Vereesa save one sister from an untimely death - that would more than make up for any damage dealt to the second, spiteful one, wouldn't it?

Jaina looked over the small space around her makeshift recovery bed for her staff. A soft querying spell and the staff's crystal took on a delicate gleam. Right beyond where Sylvanas was in the middle of her discussion with the other ranger.

The staff itself wasn't vital to Jaina's spellcasting, but it served as an anchoring point while she drew upon Azeroth's energies. Without it, she would have to reach out to the ley-lines to control the current.

Simple enough.

Jaina reached out a hand underneath the cloak and whispered the chant that would guide her magic toward the ley-line network she knew lay beneath the soil. Human cities were founded near water and ample opportunities for trade. Elven settlements were never far from the ley-lines.

There.

She stretched her awareness towards the roiling arcane energy. It was a live wire underneath her touch, and so close to a font of the Void, it left an oily aftertaste on her tongue.

It would service her well.

With Vereesa already summoned, Sylvanas had nothing left to wield as a deterrent for Jaina. If the banshee was aware of her sudden loss, she didn't show it, and did not seem aware of the opening it allowed for Jaina.

The temptation to head back to that mural and solve the circle of stars was overwhelming, but Jaina had spent decades learning how to temper her passions.

No, what Jaina really needed was leverage.

Some scrap of information that she could use to flip the script. If there were any chance that the banshee had a weakness, Jaina needed to find it; exploit it.

Call her a child?

Power shimmered along her skin. A slow, steady wind kicked up. The heat from the nearby fire was dampened by the frost that crept over her. Jaina stared down at the cloak that covered her, the silver-fur sparking an idea.

An insane idea.

She slipped the cloak on over her own, and cinched it tight before she tugged the hood up over her face. With the guise of the wolf, Jaina took a steadying, grounding breath.

Then unleashed the blizzard.

That steady wind snapped and snarled as it gave birth to a frozen, howling nightmare. Ice crystals formed in mid-air, whirling in a frenzied dance as Jaina drew the wild magic from the ley-lines and flung it around her.

The fire died, cut low by the cold snap. Snow flurried.

Time slowed around her. In a battle, even a half of a second was precious.

Sylvanas and her fellow ranger had only seconds to react as a halo of jagged ice formed over their heads. As they scrambled to escape the trap, seven spears of ice drove down where they'd been.

Jaina moved with the luxury of haste and flung out her hand to call her Staff back to her side. The moment the arcane-infused wood brushed against her palm, the pulse of magic around her was as familiar to her as her own heartbeat. The ebb and flow of energy was now hers to guide.

At once, the air glimmered around her. From the snow-flurry came three mirror images of Jaina herself. They each wore the silver cloak. They each carried the staff, and they each had just a fraction of arcane within them to trick the keen senses of even the most determined elf.

The mirrors immediately conjured and then launched sets of ice bolts against the undead, following on the impulse they'd last felt from Jaina's mind.

Frost was not as effective against unfeeling flesh, but even Sylvanas would be hard to throw off the sluggish impact of the cold.

With the elves distracted, and the blizzard effectively destroying all details beyond a meter or so, Jaina slipped into the storm and toward the inner city.

Time warp distorted noise. Jaina could not rely on the shouts and garbled commands as she fled through the white-out and toward the one place she hoped Sylvanas wouldn't expect.

The funny thing about an arcane-storm was the extension of Jaina's awareness through the wind and the wicked frost that tore through everything in its path. She could pick out the path of every sentient creature as they scrambled for cover. She could feel the structure of the city as the wind whipped around corners and screamed through open hallways.

It gave her Sight through the storm, but it kept the storm's eye upon her. She did not believe for an instant that Sylvanas nor the dark rangers would be well aware of that.

So, with a murmur, she released the spell to the natural forces around her. The storm raged wild, eagerly shedding the reins like an unbroken stallion bolting for open pasture.

The Time Warp ended and seconds returned to their proper duration, the voices that rose over the wind were sharp with agitation. Jaina ducked behind two figures locked in an eternal dance and held her breath as one particular voice drew near.

"Hannah! Isabelle! Trevor!"

The speaker was elven, judging by the lilting accent of her Common. Jaina risked a peek over the shoulder of the leading dancer and watched one of the dark rangers push through the rapidly rising snow drifts. Her bow was slung over her shoulder, her quiver cinched tight to prevent arrows from toppling out when she moved.

Jaina frowned. She couldn't move now, her destination lied on the other side of the open street the ranger walked down, and even a small invisibility spell would instantly draw attention her way.

The dark ranger knelt down and dragged pale fingers through the fresh snow before she straightened up again. Her gaze scoured the nearby buildings, over the statue Jaina hid behind, and down the open lane.

"Issa'nar ana?" The ranger gave the area another long study, then hurried onward in the same direction Jaina wanted to go.

"Great." Jaina collected her staff from where it rested against the dancers, then shrugged back into the snow herself. She expended a little effort to keep the wind up at her back to help disguise her tracks and kept pushing forward.

A flash of disappointment coursed through Jaina as she entered what she believed to be the innermost district of Falor'Thalas and found that Sylvanas had truly spoken when she meant "western spire".

She still had some distance to travel, and by now, the storm had well and truly transformed into a late autumn blizzard. Snow banked up against walls and columns and disguised the true design of that section of the city. Jaina had to slow down, only because now she trudged through knee-deep snow and had to be certain she didn't stumble over any unforeseen obstacles.

"Clea!"

Jaina cursed and slipped hard into the snow. The powder swallowed her whole until she poked her head up high enough to spy the voice's owner.

Nothing but white at first.

Then, a small shadow huddled underneath a creaking branch. Overburdened with snow, it bowed dangerously low against the body of the tree.

"Clea?! Lynara? Hello?"

The voice carried the dry rasp of the forsaken but also the unmistakable pitch of a child.

Jaina cursed again.

So the dark rangers weren't just looking for her. Well, she supposed that gave her an advantage.

"Clea?" The forsaken - no - the child called out into the storm again, her words swallowed by the howling wind.

Jaina risked another peek over the statue's shoulder. The forsaken child had a smaller, less rugged version of the leather blindfold she'd seen many of the sightless forsaken wearing. Jaina thought she could make out a bright yellow flower decorating the side of it. It looked like a sunflower.

Guilt fizzled in her gut.

Jaina cursed a third time and struggled against the emotion. It won out.

Jaina flicked her wrist and released a ripple of arcane energy out into the storm. It would call to even the deadened senses of the dark rangers and lure them in to investigate.

She hurried away, continuing on her westward path.

She berated her choice every step. She'd given up her advantage, and for what? A sycophant of the banshee who would have eagerly given up her position for curried favor.

No.

A child. She'd done it for a child with a sunflower in her hair.

A child cursed with one of the worst existences Jaina could ever picture an Azerothian going through. Her mind flashed back to the Plague. Had this child come from Andorhal? Hearthglen? One of the villages targeted after she'd sailed across the sea to Kalimdor?

The only place she knew she could rule out was after Arthas left for Northrend the second time. The forsaken were monsters, abominations that walked long after the grave should have called them home, but she'd never heard of Sylvanas condoning the resurrection of children.

Even evil has their standards, she mused.

The warmth of the peacebloom tincture had long worn off. Now, her fingers were frostbitten and stiff, resisting every grip, grasp, or gesture she attempted.

The final stretch of her journey left Jaina jittery from hypervigilance. She expected to be discovered, expected to have those horrible shadows swoop down on her. Beyond the storm, there was silence. Beyond the crunch of her footsteps and the rush of her breath, the secrets of the city around her remained in the shadow. When she arrived at the base of that ominous, serpentine spire, Jaina felt like every nerve ending had been overloaded with energy.

The western spire was different than most of the gleaming city. Even with thousands of years separating her from the heyday of Falor'Thalas, there was a subtle undercurrent of malice cut into the very stone itself. The elven structure was woven and twisted around the trunk of a towering tree surrounded by a court of lessers cloaked in the finery of autumn. Vines as thick as Jaina's arm wound through the vegetation and gave the impression of a tangled spider's web.

Snakes and spiders suited the banshee.

There was no door, no veil of hide or cloth to keep the elements out. As Jaina crossed the threshold, the blizzard came along with her to pattern the walls with snow and ice.

Inside, there was only an empty darkness. If there was debris, it was swept away, leaving only the black, clean void as Jaina's welcome into what she believed was Sylvanas' own sanctuary. The foyer was as lifeless as the city itself, with no personal touches - no hint of the woman who must have lurked here at some point in existence.

An interior staircase spiraled along the wall to the upper floors, and without any lead, Jaina could only trace the steps up. The walls were cold to the touch, and though they blocked the bite of the wind, the bitter chill followed in Jaina's footsteps as she crept higher and higher.

Much like the sanctum space Jaina had been given, the western spire was completely cut off from exterior light. With a few soft words, the crystal adorning her staff flickered with arcane and allowed her to see where she was going. Around her, the refracted gleam from over a dozen embedded crystals glimmered like pricks of starlight as she ascended higher and higher. Her fingertips brushed along the imperfections in the exterior wall, and Jaina wondered what sort of pattern she traced along the way.

Up, away from the alabaster and granite of the ground floor, and alone with only her thoughts as company, Jaina could not help but scold herself as the impulsiveness of her actions just now started to catch up to her.

Though, really, had she any other options on the table? She could have darted down into the catacombs and trapped herself in a web of rangers. She could have bolted for the forest and been hunted down like a wounded fox.

Should she have just waited like a good girl for Vereesa to arrive?

No, of course not.

With Falor'Thalas underneath a series of ward-runes, and her without a clear map of the ley-lines; Jaina could not have summoned a portal, or teleported more than a few meters without risking terrible injury to her body.

This was the right course of action, she repeated as a mantra. If she said it enough, she would eventually accept it as truth.

Past the third spiral, the wind was little more than an eerie whistle echoing up from the depths. Further along the steps, and Jaina was a silver ghost slinking through the shadows. Further along still, when her legs protest and her lungs burn with the exertion, the sounds of the storm return with a vengeance. Wood rattled and creaked, metal groaned, and the snap of fabric told Jaina she'd arrived exactly where Sylvanas would never, ever want her.

Here, there was a door. Plain wood, it opened at the gentlest touch of her hand and swung soundlessly outward. Here, Jaina could make out the crescent shape of the elven half of the spire. It curved like a sickle outward with the western wall dominated by wide, sweeping arches that opened onto a sheltered path that curled around the spire like a cat's tail. The wide arches repeated themselves and delivered unto Jaina a bird's eye view of the storm's effects upon the dead city.

Snow flared up against the buildings like waves locked in time. The wind whistled through the open thoroughfares and avenues, tearing opportunistic vines away from the branches they'd bit into.

Beyond Falor'Thalas, the forest disappeared deep into the blizzard. Above the wind, Jaina listened to the groan of the old oak, the moan of the ancient aspen and ash, and the sigh of the spruce. Without the cloud cover, how far would the forest stretch before the mountains commanded the horizon?

A noise drew her away from the arches.

Jaina cocked an ear as she called upon a muffling cantrip that dulled the roar of the wind to a kitten's purr. She turned to investigate the interior.

Here, she saw pieces of Sylvanas' existence strewn about. Where Alleria's loft had been nearly sterile, this space was a visual melody of what still haunted the exiled warchief. Like Alleria, Sylvanas had a place set aside for cartography - it made sense, a ranger in life, she would have trained to map out the lands she was tasked to watch over. Jaina flipped through several of the unfurled ones - there was Falor'Thalas, and what looked to be the mountains themselves. Several loose parchments fell out when she shuffled through older maps that detailed the Glades.

Over along the interior wall that opened into the hollowed trunk, two stands for armor stood sentinel; upon one of them rested the dreadful mantle of the Warchief, and against it, an empty, torn quiver.

Jaina didn't expect to find the bow. After all, before the first Inquisitions, the world had believed Sylvanas died in battle, with Alleria presenting the wicked bone-bow as proof of the deed - for no ranger, living or not, would part from her weapon willingly.

The weapon itself was the trophy hung in Stormwind Keep as a reminder of victory over tyranny, and absolute and complete triumph in the Blood Wars. Jaina remembered how bright the future seemed that night as the Alliance celebrated the end of the war.

Along with the warchief's mantle, the other stand stood empty. Probably meant to present the armor the banshee now wore.

Near one of the arches, the scent of tar lingered and evidence of fletching was scattered across the floor thanks to the wind.

The room was given spots of color; deep blues and greens with accents of black - the forest that Sylvanas must have loved in life. Close away the outside and set the crystals alive, and the banshee would have been in the center of a sequestered thicket.

Jaina headed into the hollowed trunk, and found herself in the middle of a storm of broken items. Torn strips of fabric, a mess of cushions that were shredded, their innards spilled over the wood like viscera. Around her, the melted remains of candles and quills with broken nibs. Parchment filled with scratched out words were half-burned, half crumpled littered the floor, the paper decorated with delicate, curving Thalassian.

Letters to whom?

Her sisters?

Former allies who still knew of her existence?

That noise again.

A rustle of something softer than fabric drew Jaina's attention further into the dark, and with the lift of her staff she revealed -

A simple jewelry box tucked away carefully in the middle of the ransacked space. Three stones sparkled at her, red, blue, and emerald. Something about the ruby stone gave her pause - it looked familiar - her fingers brushed over the cool stone.

She didn't understand. What was so important about this place that Sylvanas had deemed it off-limits? Jaina saw no weapons, no grand designs. Nothing save the memories of an elf.

"Was this everything you hoped for?"

Sylvanas' voice whipped Jaina around. The banshee stood in the fading shadows, the mist that coiled over her body thicker than the darkness that dominated the room. It was more tangible, more real somehow.

"I don't know what I expected," Jaina answered honestly.

Sylvanas strode into the broken room, herding Jaina away from the trinkets and back toward the exit. She adjusted the pendants carefully, then turned her glower on Jaina.

"I was only trying to help," Jaina said when no further response from Sylvanas was forthcoming.

"Help?" Sylvanas scoffed. "Meddle, you mean. Though with your track record - I wasn't surprised you didn't abstain from interfering." Sylvanas' words rang with that playful, mocking tone that Jaina was beginning to associate with the banshee lording a secret amusement.

Power hummed at Jaina's fingertips but she did not release it just yet. "Neither of us have time for games, Banshee. What are you insinuating?"

Sylvanas smirked and pounced on the opening she'd been looking for. "Why, the Legion, of course. The world was on the cusp of doom and yet the leader of the Kirin Tor disappears? How dreadful."

Jaina sent an impassive glance down to her bandaged fingers, the accusation easily brushed off as errant dust. "That's what you're holding against me? My proven-right prediction against your Horde?"

"Oh, no." Sylvanas shook her head and took a step forward as she aimed her next attack.

To Jaina's credit, she did not respond with a step backward. The time for diplomacy had ended. She would be happy to remind Sylvanas that she was a leader in her own right, and with a personal power that far eclipsed that of a disgraced undead elf.

"Let's retrace the steps, shall we? You abstained from that all-too famous translocation power when your High King faced down his own doom -"

"You abandoned the Alliance to die!"

Sylvanas clucked her tongue. "Is that what alleviated the guilt you felt? Blaming it on someone else?"

That icy rush of power crept higher up Jaina's hands. It took everything to remind herself that Sylvanas enjoyed throwing out bait and then digging salt into the wounds she inflicted. _Don't rise to it, don't rise to it, don't rise to it_ , she repeated over and over.

 _Why not?_ Another part of her, a darker - far more vengeful part wondered.

Jaina closed her eyes against the sound of Sylvanas' smug chuckle. She counted down from twenty, centered her focus, and focused on her breathing.

Sylvanas, undeterred by Jaina's lack of response, pushed deeper. "Do you blame the Horde, Lord Admiral, for how you just let your father die? Theramore's built on his bones, is it not?"

That snapped Jaina's eyes back open. The mantra died. The promise to be the better woman turned to ash on her lips.

"You know nothing about Theramore," Jaina growled. A pressure pounded just behind her eyes as raw arcane energy coalesced within her. "You know nothing about me -"

"I know you could have stopped Arthas."

That stole her breath. It reached right into the very core of what Jaina had spent years rebuilding and snatched those emotional supports like they were made of sand, but Jaina has had years to learn how to brace against the crash of that particular wave, and so lets the accusation wash over her. Arthas was too distant to be anything more than a dull ache somewhere in the vicinity of her girlhood.

The energy around her died. The icy wave of magic that had been circling around her fell to the ground like raindrops, splashing at her feet, and the pressure eased behind her eyes.

"Arthas?"

"Yes," Sylvanas sneered, and stalked forward with her claws figuratively extended. "I remember your lament in the Halls of Reflection -"

"Stratholme." Jaina cut in. "Yes. It's hard to not question if I did the right thing." She set her staff down, the butt of it clicking gently as it came to rest on the floor. The ice dripped off her hands as she let the spell go. "But Arthas was - " she blinked as the mental tally of the years registered. "Nearly twenty years ago. Whatever legacy he forged, it's gone now -"

"Gone?" Sylvanas snapped, and the crimson of her gaze burned through the delicate skin around her eyes. "You think Arthas is gone?"

"I know he's gone," Jaina risked stepping closer. A shudder raced through the banshee before her as she gripped the ruby pendant tighter against her. "He has no power over you anymore, Sylvanas - haven't you let him have it long enough?"

"You know nothi-"

"I know why you don't want to raise Vereesa in undeath." Now Jaina recognized the ruby stone, as Sylvanas cradled it in her hand. She remembered asking Vereesa about it at Rhonin's funeral, when the youngest Windrunner had held it out over the bodiless pyre and debating dropping it into the flames.

Sylvanas stilled. "Do you now?"

Jaina was treading dangerous waters. "I've been trying to figure out why you were so damned mercurial about my being here. After all, if I fail, then your little sister comes back and stays … but not for you." Jaina's words trailed off as she voiced her thoughts aloud.

Sylvanas now stared at her over a shoulder, her look venomous. Even in undeath, tension coiled in that powerful frame, and the sobering realization that the wrong word, or if she overstepped too soon, Jaina would be on the receiving end of a banshee's malicious temper.

"Well?" Sylvanas faced her. The sneer of her lips revealed the sharp point of her fangs. "By all means, finish your thought."

"If … there is another way to save Alleria, then Vereesa doesn't have to die, but her life - their life - will continue on … without you." Jaina risked another step forward. Sylvanas was stock still against the table she stood before. "Either way, you feel like you've got to make a sacrifice again, don't you?"

Sylvanas didn't answer. The venom in her features was frozen.

It was an opening Jaina had to take. She thought of her reconciliation with her mother and the release of the grief she'd carried on her shoulders. The burden Sylvanas must carry still … "You don't have to sacrifice anything, B… Sylvanas. Let them in, talk to them - there's still time to heal -"

"Heal?" That drew a response. Sylvanas laughed, dark and bitter. "The dead don't heal, you stupid child. We stagnate. We rot. We're meant to be in the ground -"

"You don't believe that - if you just -"

"If I just what? Simper for mercy? Let love in?" Sylvanas snarled. "Arthas killed that -"

"Arthas is DEAD!" Jaina's voice cracked. "He's been dead for years! He can't hurt anyone anymore. He can't hurt you anymore, so why do you still allow him power over you?!"

Jaina might as well have struck true with an ice lance for how deathly still Sylvanas went. For an agonizing heartbeat, she dared to hope that she'd cracked through the Banshee Queen to reach Sylvanas underneath.

"Get out."

Jaina blinked, not quite understanding.

"I said get out!" Sylvanas charged at her, her form unraveling into tendrils of shadow and necromancy. The banshee's scream crescendoed into a dreadful wail that forced Jaina to drop her staff; forced her hands to clap against her ears in a pitiful defense against the magic that assaulted her.

Gods, even her bones reverberated with the force and pressure built and built and then released in a single rush of sweet agony in her.

Her vision blurred.

Jaina cried out as that mass of shadows slammed into her and flung her back against the archways. She twisted to catch herself. An alarming bolt of pain exploded outward from her spine as she overextended to snatch the elegant latticework to prevent her toppling even further.

She skidded to a stop with her heels just over the edge of the tower. The bandages over her fingers were stained red again and she knew that she'd ripped her fingertips further. They throbbed in time with her racing heartbeat - she couldn't keep her grip forever.

Just as her fingers gave way, and the world just started to lurch around her - a powerful claw tangled in the fabric of her robes and hauled her up and up further. Her hands slapped over half-corporeal arms and struggled for purchase only to find none. As soon as her fingers closed over cold, hard flesh, it went to mist and left her grip floundering.

"Leave." The words came out in a hiss, a whisper that scratched at her eardrums. "Get the hell out of my city and never come back."

Jaina struggled, tried to find the elf inside the phantom that had a hold of her. There was nothing left in that creature but the burn of torment.

Then?

Jaina felt the cold rush of wind. The whistle of air. The panic that welled in her throat as she fell down, further down - she didn't even have her staff - the tremor of her body as she readied a teleportation spell - how much time did she have before the ground -

Oblivion.


	9. Chapter 9

Why do you allow him power over you?

Awareness, slow like the drip of honey, returned to Jaina.

It brought her back into a world that smells sick-sweet of pooling blood - her blood? Sight, at first fuzzy and distant, painted a picture of a choking night sky clogged with brilliant, swirling white. Everything was painted in broad strokes of shadow and light as the void of unconsciousness peeled back.

She heard nothing but the anger of the storm, distant now that it's had time away from the rage that conjured it. The wind howled but it no longer carried that thrum of power. Her mind struggled to return to function, and her thoughts tumbled in vertigo as Jaina gathered her wits around her.

Touch returned to her in stinging numbness and tingling pins that sent hard, jagged streaks of pain along her limbs as she began to test her range of movement. Jaina's left shoulder screamed in particular, refusing to comply with even the most forceful of her demands. Jaina tried to remember the lessons of combat medicine and found they all slipped from her before she could even touch on one word.

Carefully, terrified to discover what she might find, Jaina worked her muscles and limbs in short bursts. The snowdrift she'd landed in had absorbed much of the impact, but Jaina had to be sure the shocking lack of sensation in her lower legs was because she'd lost consciousness in the middle of a winter storm.

Not because -

No. She would not give into panic.

She fumbled a hand into her satchel. Her fingers didn't respond quite as quick or agile as she'd like. They'd been exposed too long to the cold. Still, stubbornness was the birthright of any Kul Tiran, and this was not how Jaina wanted her last minute to go.

As her fingers fought the demand to function, Jaina dredged up pieces of her power to undo the clasp. The contents tumbled out, and a vial of a warm liquid rolled into Jaina's frozen palm. One of three restorative potions she'd packed. Her hand shook as she brought the vial up, her fingers unwilling to work the stopper, but when the contents tipped down into her throat, she immediately felt relief.

Everything dulled. Cold, pain, and her nerves. The live wires that ran through her body quieted as the potion's effects dampened her body's responses to painful stimuli.

Jaina pressed her weight onto her right arm and shifted into an awkward slouch. She stared down her body toward her feet and deliberately wriggled and moved each one until she was satisfied that it was actual, purposeful movement caused by her will.

She sat up and tugged her double layer of cloaks around her shoulders. Her right arm ached, but Jaina believed it was from exposure to the cold, not … whatever prevented her from doing anything productive with her left.

The Staff of Antonius was buried nearby, the wooden stave sticking out of the snow like a crooked street sign. Without the need for secrecy, Jaina brought the weapon to her with a gesture and then used the staff to center and then right herself as she stood. She tilted her neck back, and through the wash of relief that she felt no pain nor resistance, she glared up at the trajectory she'd traveled.

The dead vines suffered from her passage, the broken greenery perfectly detailing the path she'd carved through the brambles. With the snow piled against her knees, Jaina knew she'd been lucky not to strike something worse.

Then Jaina remembered why she'd fallen through bramble and embankment.

The vial shattered with a flex of her fist and the glass crumbled down into the snow. There were shards, Jaina felt them through the potion's numbness, but she didn't care at the moment. The spike of pain granted clarity.

In the eye of the hurricane of her design, Jaina saw the devastation around her. A brief touch of ironic amusement, Sylvanas had been right. Jaina had been acting the naive child that believed with just enough stubborn pride and willful hope that she could fix something irreparably broken.

A bitter laugh escaped her just to be swallowed by the dying wind. Somewhere above her, Jaina believed she could hear the anguish of a banshee, but she didn't dwell on it. She didn't have to dwell on it anymore.

Jaina gathered her cloaks around her for a second time before she resigned herself to the trudge back to the squat building. She cared about nothing but the goal of retrieving her things and fulfilling the request made of her.

Sylvanas wanted her gone? Fine.

To hell with the plight of elves, those living and dead.

Jaina had already gone through the cycle of being batted back and forth between two powerful entities, and she bore the mana-scars of that fallout on her body still. She cared for Vereesa, truly cared for the emotional happiness that her friend deserved after thirty some-odd years of pain - some of it that Jaina carried the burden of guilt still.

Jaina stormed through Falor'Thalas as she backtracked through the inner districts. Without the blinding winds, there was a spectral, silent beauty that hung over the dead city, but any tease of wonder at the glimmering winter spectacle was devoured by the gnawing pit of anger right underneath Jaina's ribs.

Here and there, Jaina noticed the evidence of the citizens that the city still sheltered. As she closed in on the section that she'd once considered hers, the few signs of life disappeared. As she entered it, Jaina found her court lifeless and buried under the brunt of the magical avalanche she'd unleashed. Snow and ice lashed against the stone, and branches that had once supported masterworks of architecture were now broken and bent against the raw destruction of arcane-infused nature.

Good.

The destruction untwisted the knot in Jaina's chest just a smidge. Vindictiveness had never been an emotion she enjoyed, but Jaina would be damned if she didn't indulge in the rush of catharsis it brought with it.

The archmage whistled for Scout as she headed into the gentle dancing light of the canopy to recover her possessions. Underneath the swaying illusion, Jaina checked her wards. The wolf-cloak that currently rested around her shoulders had once been tucked upstairs and somewhat out of the way, so she didn't have to keep looking at it. That meant someone had entered here when Sylvanas had promised to stay out.

Hadn't Jaina done the same thing?

Nope. Not a thought she wanted to follow at the moment.

Jaina took that moment from her security check to makeshift a sling from one of the cloaks that she'd had to scrap a week previously, and tucked her left arm into it. A throbbing, dull ache settled in the space just behind her shoulder-joint, but at least it was now supported until she could have it checked out.

The sound of hoofbeats spurred her back into action. Her fingers, stiff as they were, still danced over the warding symbols and runic enchantments and found … nothing. Nothing amiss, nothing out of place. Sylvanas, or whichever minion she'd summoned for the task, had only come for the cloak and nothing more.

Well. That changed nothing in the end.

Jaina flexed her arcane skill as she drew the meager contents of her life here and collected them for her departure. She hesitated on the gifts; the dagger and the travel pack before she weighed them against pragmatism's worth and added the gifts to her arsenal.

Her journal, the original sketches, ruminations about her theories concerning the obvious troll influence on the elven city, and all of her thoughts were secured for a later retrospective once she was tucked back in Boralus and far away from the antics of mainlanders.

Jaina left only the massive, weighted banner behind. She couldn't picture a use for the Shattered Mask beyond kindling and momentarily dreamt of a satisfying fire. However, the uneasy implications of the forsaken who lurked through Falor'Thalas and the obvious care the tapestry had while they'd held it halted her hand before the fire could even wisp up smoke.

She left the banner crumpled but intact underneath the rippling canopy.

Winter followed Jaina out of the city. The kingly boughs of the oak and pine were brought low under the weight of their ivory and ice crowns. Frost glittered on the branches and spun a whimsical archway that Jaina ducked underneath. The golden gleam of autumn was still there underneath the ice, waiting for the thaw to steal one last bit of glory before the quiet snowfall swallowed the verdant courts until the spring.

The sensation of being watched followed Jaina as well, though this time there was no attempt to disguise their presence from her. In the high places, the shadows of the dark rangers balanced against their precarious watch-towers as they tracked her presence. In the space between buildings, the occasional glint of gold revealed the presence of one of the forsaken bold enough to risk a peek at the leaving human.

Scout managed to work through the high snow without too much trouble, but Jaina's exit from the city was slower than she'd wanted, and it just left her to stew on the events of the past hour. The further she put distance between her and the banshee, the thicker the anger coiled in her until even Scout was feeding off the energy.

The mare whickered, nervous, and side-danced off the path.

"Scout now's not the time," Jaina chided, and lifted the reins slowly to control the mare's head until she settled. It took time; time she did not believe she could spare. Not when her heart picked up the pace at the thought of that horrible darkness pouring out of the forest to grab her once again.

Scout whickered again, forehoof stamping against the snow as she resisted Jaina's call to settle, and pranced away from the path once more.

Jaina's grip tightened before it loosened. With a sigh, she slipped out of the saddle and rounded the mare to take the lead. "Come on, girl."

Scout resisted at first, but with a gentle guide, Jaina coaxed the mare into following her through the southern streets. Out from the cluster of buildings, the snow was not as dramatic, but it slowed them down as woman and beast maneuvered through the knee-high drifts.

Scout eventually settled enough to allow Jaina to ride, both horse and rider were too wound up. Jaina wondered, idly, as Scout's ears flicked madly, if the horse was worried about the same sort of monster that she was - or if the horse picked up on Jaina's fears.

A day out from Falor'Thalas and the snow melted enough to warrant a quicker pace than a slow march. The winter storm had centered on Falor'Thalas, and as Jaina entered autumn's domain, she tried to leave the anger behind with the ice and cold.

Three days out and the city felt like a dream. A distant afternoons pretend with a fuzziness to the details of the entire affair.

Five days out and Jaina finally began to believe that she would leave, and that thought brought up a new wave of anxiety. A heartbeat of panic before Jaina cooly shut down the worries that came with Vereesa's name in her mind.

Jaina recognized the landscape as she started looking for a spot to camp for the night. She was on a high incline and had a commanding view of the ridge and valleys below her. Far to the west, Jaina saw the desecration of the Blight. There was a stark line underneath the true horizon where the kingdom of autumn just stopped. Beyond it, a wasteland even her human eyes could see.

A kingdom left to wither into memory. Once, there had been an Aspect capable of burning the rot away until the charred corpse of the land could begin to heal, but that power was lost to Azeroth now. Jaina turned her gaze from the Blighted lands and down into the forests directly below her.

She saw smoke drifting up through the sparse treeline. Smelt the richness of a campfire on the wind.

Caution born from her recent archeological attempts guided Jaina's movements as she dismounted and hitched Scout to a nearby fallen log. The mare nuzzled at her shoulder before dropping her head to pick at the grass and moss.

Jaina approached the ridgeline and crouched low as she came to the edge. There was a thicket of dried branches long shedded of their summer leaves that she used as cover. The sticks scraped against her skin as she maneuvered herself into a position that she could hold for a while, then she set her staff sideways on her lap. A small gesture and the crystal at the end of her staff darkened to the blue of the ocean's depths.

From her satchel, Jaina produced smooth, polished quartz carved into the shape of a sphere. She felt the pressure build behind her eyes as she balanced the sphere in one hand, and lifted her other above it. As her fingers curled in the air, Jaina's gaze went to the smoke trailing in the wind.

Jaina watched the smoke drift lazily in the gentle breeze that lifted it up and away from the trees, and then, as the pressure grew to be uncomfortable, there was a pop somewhere behind her right eye and -

She stared at the source of the smoke itself. A bird's eye view of the hastily-erected camp built without fear of being discovered. Several tents littered the clearing not too far from where Jaina camped over a month earlier. The open canvas provided shelter for six bedrolls, scattered underneath the fabric. Jaina turned her head, and the sight swiveled to find only two mules hitched to the trees, but no horses, or more exotic mounts.

The fire was built to last for a while and had been set up for cooking something a bit more sturdy than reheated rations.

And around the fire, six Lightforged were in various activities. One of them, a slender Draenei woman with sweeping horns leaned over a map marked in the draeneic glyphs. She wore leather and mail armor suitable for a trek through the woods, as did three others: two women, and a man. Jaina remembered the style of armor from the Draenor expedition, and the outfitted regiments the Draenei offered the Kaldorei before the Cataclysm. The rangari were the "eyes of the prophet," or the Draenei equivalent to the elven farstriders.

Jaina frowned and shifted the sight to look over the final two Lightforged.

Recognition flooded her, and she fumbled to keep the scrying from disintegrating.

Two male Draenei wearing the full plate of the Lightforges front-line warriors sat on a log and were deep in conversation. Their weapons rested just within reach and even through the scrying spell, the holy energy that radiated from them saturated the air, and to Jaina's magical sense, it was no different than the cloying, stagnate humidity of Stranglethorn.

One of them had the same sort of sweeping horns as the first rangari, but one of his horns was broken halfway through. The injury had long been smoothed over and capped with gold that matched the brands that decorated the parts of his alabaster skin that were exposed. He shifted his arm, and Jaina narrowed in on the detail work just underneath his shoulder pauldron. There was a dullness to the white-gold armor - like he'd repaired it in a hurry.

Broken-Horn ran a hand over his face, then stood up to approach the rangari detachment.

Jaina was tempted to pour more energy into the scrying to allow her to hear, but in a regiment of Draenei, she doubted they would be speaking any language she knew fluently.

She broke the scrying spell and lifted her gaze to track the flight path of a bird rustled out of the canopy. Below her was a tracking party led by a warrior who had called for Vereesa and her heads - accusing them of being as void-lost as Kivan.

They were also warriors who had been foiled by a tipsy ranger and a mage after two bottles. That sort of bruise to one's pride was hard enough to shake without a dash of righteous belief added into the mix.

Jaina thought briefly to the conversation with the two younger Windrunner sisters, about the face justice wore in the presence of an all-knowing Light and the enforcement it wielded.

Jaina clucked her tongue, then extracted herself from the ridgeline. Her shoulder twinged painfully, and so she returned to Scout to pull out the last restorative draught from where she'd placed it in the saddlebags. While she waited for the potion to work, she debated what to do.

They were tracking Jaina's camps, and the sting of her movement discovered after she'd tried to keep as low a profile as possible faded with the understanding that most rangari were rangers with thousands of years of experience.

They might find where Jaina set up her last camp, and then where would they go from there? She'd teleported, and though she trusted in the reputation of the rangari as phenomenal trackers - she didn't think they'd be able to trace the portal.

At the same time …

Jaina sighed. The elven ward she'd uncovered had a clever dissuading rune upon it, but it was not the Ban'dinoriel - the Gatekeeper that had protected Silvermoon for thousands of years. t would keep any curious travelers from just stumbling through the boundary, but give the Draenei a mage and just like any wall - it could crumble.

And so what?

The only thing it protected was a ruined city filled with the ruins of a people that should have long been laid to rest, and ruled by a shadow of a woman. It was Jaina's duty to the Alliance to offer the Lightforged a direct line to the Wintering Land.

And yet…

Even with Teldrassil, with Boralus, with her brother now ash and lost a second time - what Jaina believed awaited Sylvanas at the end of the line was far more than the judgment and execution of the Light.

Not to mention the little sunflower girl. What would her fate be if the Lightforged uncovered the existence of forsaken children?

"I'm an idiot," Jaina muttered aloud before she seized her staff and strode towards a patch of the woods about two hundred yards away from the ridge. Here, the trees grew closer together and their branches tangled above her. Jaina went into the center of the grove before she tilted her gaze to the canopy itself.

"There's something She needs to see before I leave."

Silence answered her but that suited Jaina just fine. She turned on a heel to return to Scout and allowed herself just a hint of a smirk. Let the dark rangers be startled for once.

Jaina roused from her slumber when her boundary glyph tripped. She stared blearily into the dark around her, then pushed up into a more dignified position. The moon was long below the horizon, but she couldn't hear birdsong.

Early morning then.

Jaina dressed with the assistance of magic. Her shoulder still resisted any real range of motion, and she wanted the security of her armor and regalia for this meeting - though she had not expected it so soon.

All that was left of her evening's fire was a pile of smoldering embers, and as Jaina looked out into the treeline, she found a pair of embers there as well, watching her.

Jaina never believed she could ever have described the Banshee Queen as a skittish person, but as she observed the elven ranger gingerly entering into the circle of Jaina's camp, she couldn't think of a better word.

The undead ranger was restless; she fidgeted with her fingers, the leather of her gloves creaking as she worked them in the chill of the pre-morning.

"Kalira was rather upset that you spotted her," Sylvanas chose a spot opposite Jaina to stand.

"I hadn't, actually," Jaina revealed, "but I didn't think you'd let me just leave without observation."

"Mm."

Jaina took in a long, steadying breath. She was still angry - so angry about being thrown from the tower, but retribution for that could come later; not at the hands of a Lightforged bully, but by her design.

"What did you need me to see?" Sylvanas asked when there was no further prompt from Jaina. "I would have expected -"

"Nope." Jaina sliced a hand through the air, cutting off the banshee's words with a silencing spell. Jaina regretted the dark between them just because she couldn't make out the indignation she felt brimming from that gesture. "We are not talking about anything that happened in the past month, or I will probably hand you over before I realize what I've done."

Jaina tapped the butt of her staff gently on the ground, and the campfire crackled back to life. The blaze of light illuminated the ranger opposite her and revealed the silhouette of a massive winged creature furled underneath one of the sturdier branches. "A bat?"

"One of the surviving plague ones, yes." Sylvanas acknowledged after the silencing effect wore off. There was a tinge of frustration in the ghostly echo of her voice, but she waited for Jaina to speak again.

"Right." Jaina drummed her fingers along her staff, then turned to approach the ridgeline. She didn't check to see if Sylvanas was following her. Without the benefit of daylight, or any other source of light, picking her way along the loose rock at the edge was dangerous.

She stepped toward the thicket, and a cold leather glove closed around her right forearm, pulling her just a tad off-balance. "What are you doing?" She hissed as Sylvanas let go.

"You've already taken one tumble, Lady Proudmoore, let's not have another so soon." Sylvanas moved up, and around her right, her hood lowered as her gaze dropped to the ground they picked through. When Sylvanas found a suitable path, she turned, and the banshee held out that gloved hand again.

Jaina's first instinct was to slap it away, but if she didn't want to risk being seen, she needed the advantage of elven sight at night. She took the offered hand and allowed herself to be brought along. The sticks scratched gently against her skin again, and she settled back into her earlier pose to grant comfort over a longer spell scry.

Sylvanas crouched at her side, and her stare was out towards the western land.

Jaina couldn't help herself as she pulled out the quartz sphere. "Do you regret it?"

Sylvanas tensed near her, and that hood turned so Jaina couldn't even make out the gleam of her eyes to gauge the reaction. "What required my presence out here, Lady Proudmoore?"

Jaina pursed her lips as she conjured the scrying spell for the second time. There was less pressure behind her eyes now that Jaina had a better awareness of the location she was peeking into, but she caught the blue gleam reflecting off the quartz all the same as the arcane leaked into her gaze. There was a touch of violet, there, just for a second, as Sylvanas turned to watch, then the orb revealed the Lightforged camp.

Two rangari were on sentry duty, though they looked as if they'd have rather taken the extra hours of sleep instead. The mules nodded off at their hitching post. Broken-Horn and his companion perched at the fire, the brands gleaming and bright against the flames.

"How much did Vereesa tell you about the incident with Kivan?" Jaina murmured.

Without seeing Sylvanas, hearing the echo of her voice unsettled Jaina to the point that the spell nearly flickered out. "Enough of it to understand you both are sentimental fools."

"These two were the Lightforged Vereesa held off. I believe they're tracking our movements - mine in particular. Now, I teleported, so my trail's about to go cold, but Vereesa…"

"Is an experienced ranger."

"As are the rangari," Jaina pointed out. She pulled her sight from the camp but left the image on the orb itself. She turned to face Sylvanas. "Your wards are based loosely on Ban'dinoriel, but they'd need a mage with an understanding of ancient elven runework and -"

"I understand." Sylvanas cursed softly. She went quiet, her gaze hard on the image between them. "You allowed me time to evacuate the city, th-"

"Let me work on the wards."

"-you - what?" Sylvanas' gaze snapped up to meet her own.

"Allow me to strengthen the wards. You want to keep the world out, yes?" Jaina continued as Sylvanas nodded. "Then allow a transmutation archmage to secure the entrances and exits into your land."

"I almost killed you," Sylvanas stated.

"Yes, and I am furious with you for trying," Jaina was proud of the lack of emotion in her words. She had slipped on the mask of the diplomat who had negotiated the trade between Orgrimmar and Darnassus and that polite neutrality assisted her now in not ripping ice lances through the woman next to her. "However, that," she gestured to the scrying spell as the image dissipated, "is not about what happened between us. I saw the children, Sylvanas."

Sylvanas stiffened, then let out an unneeded sigh. "Of course you did. Very well, Lady Proudmoore."

Jaina glanced sidelong to her as the banshee straightened. Again, a hand was offered to allow her a safe walk along the ridgeline.

"What are you proposing, Lord Admiral?"


	10. Chapter 10

The first trill of birdsong broke into the early morning quiet and jostled Jaina out of her unexpected doze. She lifted her head, vision bleary as her mind struggled to piece together the fundamental questions of what, where, when, and most importantly who.

Her head hurt. It'd been bothering her since the fall in Falor'Thalas, but with the restorative draughts, she'd been able to keep the brunt of the pain managed. Before, she'd been relying on the hope of teleporting back to Dalaran and immediately into the service of a healer, but now all she could think of was that the birds were singing at such a shrill volume and the first streak of sunlight deliberately aimed for her eyes.

Underneath the birdsong, Jaina heard the soft flow of an elven conversation. She sat up and searched until she spotted Sylvanas and one of the dark rangers - Kalira, hadn't she mentioned - standing near a massive plague bat who was in the middle of grooming an outstretched wing. The bat stood a solid head or two higher than either of the elves with a body that was framed as wide as one of the draft horses the Norwich Estates reared. Kalira had a side-pack cradled underneath her arm, resting her forearm on the pack as she conversed. Being that the two were undead, Jaina found it difficult to read into their body language.

Hearing Jaina, Sylvanas broke off from the conversation and took the saddlebag from Kalira before she crossed the grass towards the mage's position. Kalira, dressed in modest dark grey leathers with accents of moss green along her shoulder guard and gauntlets went back to tending to the oblivious bat.

"Lady Proudmoore," Sylvanas came to a halt a solid distance away. "I sent Kalira out to survey the Lightforged camp while you were resting. She's returned with a better sense of their numbers and what they're expecting to encounter out here. Also," she reached into the pack and removed a small vial of shimmering maroon liquid, "while I'm not quite sure they originated from Azerothian herbs, the curative remedies of the Draenei seem just as effective for field medicine until a healer sees you."

Jaina craned her neck to see the potion that Sylvanas held up for her perusal. "How are you certain it's a -"

"How are you certain that it's not poison, you mean?" Sylvanas shrugged, the gesture was oddly casual on her. "You don't, but I would expect you consider me a mite more intelligent than maiming you just as I've agreed to let you work your talents on the defensive wards." Sylvanas flicked the vial towards Jaina, who barely caught it before the glass smashed against the ground. The vial was welcomed warmth against Jaina's palm, and on closer inspection, she smelled the earthy scent of Ba'ruun's Bloom - a hearty mushroom that'd been a staple of many of the remedies the Alliance forces required during their Draenor expedition.

Jaina lifted her attention from the vial toward the banshee before her. Sylvanas had a point, it would be somewhat impulsive and fickle for Sylvanas to poison her; but at the same time, Jaina found it difficult to trust at face value anything that the woman across from her said, or did.

Sylvanas' heel scuffed against the loose rock of their vantage point as she returned to Kalira and the bat. Jaina watched her leave, then glanced back at the vial in her hand. Without the distraction of conversation, the dull throb of a headache threatened to creep back on Jaina; so with a grimace, Jaina popped the stopper off the vial and tossed the potion back with a quick twist of the wrist.

The liquid warmed her throat as it went, and with it, the various aches and pains she'd accumulated settled to nothing while the threatened headache faded to a twinge behind her left eye that only flared when she focused on it. The aftertaste left something to be desired, so as Jaina picked herself up, she took a swig from her waterskin and felt relief that movement did not come with pain.

Sylvanas glanced side-long as Jaina neared, and swapped from the fast-paced Thalassian to her slower, accented Common. " - the mare's capable on a good day to push a solid twenty leagues, and as our Lord Admiral is known to hail from a nation with good horsemanship, we'll need rest areas - change in gait and patterns of grass wear."

Jaina quirked a brow. "That sounds tedious, and the job for several dozen rangers with a few days advanced warning." A soft chuff of breath from her right suggested Kalira felt the same way.

Sylvanas didn't chuckle, but she acknowledged Jaina's observation with a quick nod. "I would prefer a week's forewarning, actually, but we'll make do with hours. Kalira saw to it that the sentries won't wake for a little while longer, and their bellies grumbling enough that the camp will want to idle for a filling meal before setting out."

"How -? Nevermind." Jaina cut off her question. There wasn't enough time to spend satisfying her curiosity. "Aiding the misdirection buys me more time with the wards, so, what can I do?"

Sylvanas exchanged a look with Kalira, then gestured for the dark ranger to take the lead in answering. Kalira spoke up immediately, "I could use your frost magic; three leagues north along the path. I found a narrowing of the horse-trail that could send horse and rider along a nasty tumble if they were startled by a hungry predator."

Jaina suddenly had the urge to lay eyes on Scout. She cast her gaze around the clearing, heartbeat kicking up in her throat until -

Scout's head lifted from the moss she'd commandeered as her breakfast as if Jaina's gaze was enough to gain the mare's attention. She chewed on her morsel for a moment longer, then dropped her head back to her meal.

Jaina let out a quiet breath and met the gazes of the two elves who both wore the same impassive stare. "All right, then." Jaina felt it better to move on before either one decided that commenting on her moment of panic was a proper next step. "When do we set out?"

"Now, if you're up for the flight," Sylvanas answered. "Kalira will take Brittlemane and establish a trail towards the detour. You and I will design the scene of your unfortunate mishap along the trail. Afterward, Galen will take you back onto the upper ridge to the nearest ward and you will … do whatever it is you need to do." Sylvanas waved a dismissive hand in a suggestion of the spellweaving that Jaina would need to do.

"Brittlemane?"

Sylvanas led her over to an unrolled leather tarp. Upon it, a complete horse skeleton resided. With a subtle gesture, Jaina watched as dark spirals of magic drifted from Sylvanas' hands towards the bones. Jaina couldn't help but send out a quiet, exploratory gesture of her own as the violet tendrils seeped into the bleached skeleton.

Jaina had only tasted necromancy's unique twist on the arcane a few times during her career. The first had been during the Plague itself and jumped off from Jaina's insatiable curiosity about what macabre transmutation the grain brought onto its victims. That first encounter felt much like how Jaina suspected the rotten grain did: slimy, the spells that animated the ghouls stuck to her arcane spellwork like oil slicks upon water.

The second time she experimented with understanding the individual touch upon necromancy, she had stood in the Halls of Reflection and faced down a man she'd once believed she could marry. That touch of death had frozen her to the very bedrock of her soul, a cold far more bitter than the ice magic that she commanded for herself.

This time, the third query, felt different once again. Sylvanas' command of necromancy was not cold, nor sickly. It felt like the whispers, only without the beguiling promise behind them. This was a command, and it even had Jaina rising on her toes to follow.

Kalira rested a hand on her shoulder, and the weight grounded Jaina. She pulled her spell back and waited as the bones reanimated.

The horse bones rattled and rolled together like they were attached to an invisible string. The bones danced until piece by piece they connected - but instead of ligament and tendon, Jaina watched as ropes twined from shadow took the place of connective tissue, tugging and twisting until the skeleton no longer lay before them, but stood upon four legs. It watched them with empty sockets, and Jaina wondered if she would find the same intelligence as she would see in Scout's own.

Sylvanas lowered her hands and jerked her chin once at Kalira. The dark ranger removed her grip from Jaina's shoulder and approached the undead mount. Kalira swung onto the creature's bare back without complaint and settled carefully between the shoulder-blades, and urged the mount into the woods.

Jaina watched her leave, then turned to Sylvanas, brow arched in question.

Sylvanas must have been in a jovial mood, for she explained as she stepped over the empty tarp toward the bat itself. "When Kalira summoned me, I figured Galen here wouldn't always be the wisest choice for traveling. He tires, after all." Sylvanas unwrapped the beasts' reins and gently tossed them up and over his massive, triangle-shaped head to land on the saddle. She then tucked Thori'dal into a custom-designed holster for the bow, and with it, her quiver. "However, at the moment, he'll suit our purpose."

Sylvanas rounded the creature and reached a hand up to hoist herself into the saddle. She leaned over the side to smirk down at Jaina. "Do you want to be the little spoon or the big spoon?"

When Jaina didn't respond immediately, Sylvanas' smirk grew into a wicked grin. Jaina flushed and scampered up and into the saddle without waiting for assistance. As she pulled herself up to be level with Sylvanas, she weighed the two options heavily before she chose to sit in the front. Sylvanas said nothing but reached one arm around her to pick up the reins and encourage the bat to begin lumbering forward.

There was only a momentary pause, as the beast stretched out its foreclaws to seize upon something large that Jaina couldn't quite make out, but what she could smell was blood and the musk of horseflesh.

"If you attempt to toss me again …" Jaina spoke up as two leathery wings unfurled to either side of her. The shock of the take-off forced her back against Sylvanas, who took the sudden crush of the mage with only a soft grunt.

"You're a mage," is all Sylvanas said, and with the bat climbing in altitude, Jaina didn't want to turn around and be in that close of proximity to the banshee. If she saw a smirk or a sneer, there'd be a literal frozen corpse behind her.

"Yes, you're observant. That doesn't change what you did."

"I believe slowfall is one of the first spells the Magisters taught to any aspiring apprentice in Silvermoon due to the high spires. Is Dalaran lax on that sort of spellcraft?"

Jaina almost turned around. Almost. "How far to the detour?"

Sylvanas adjusted her position behind Jaina, and her glove creaked as it closed around the reins in a firm one-handed grip. "Two hours by flight, give or take."

For the Lightforged, without mounts of their own, that would be at least a day or two's march, probably less with the Light fortifying them - and the rangari are used to traversing steep terrain. "I don't understand: why didn't they bring any steeds with them or winged mounts? I have a cold trail -"  
"Any beast large enough to carry a fully-kitted warrior through the air is going to be too large to flit through the canopy. Autumn still has sway over the lower forests, and it would be hard for even a Farstrider to keep an eye on tracks over a month old."

"It feels like a waste of time for them."

Sylvanas hummed, noncommittal. "Is it? There are no wars, no dire threats that require the tenacity and drive that the Lightforged become imbued with."

"There's always the threat of the Black Empire rising."

Sylvanas scoffed, dismissing Jaina's words. "Hardly. What army the parasitic so-called "gods" once had was crushed by the end of the Blood War, and without the Naga, Queen Azshara cowered back into the depths along with whatever master calls her puppet."

Jaina disagreed, and shifted slightly to toss Sylvanas a critical look. The banshee, for her merit, merely stared back, challenging Jaina to prove her wrong. They were several hundred meters above the ridgeline now, and the wind whistled cold against Jaina's ears. Under Sylvanas' hood, her eyes glinted ruby as she awaited Jaina's response.

Even with the wolf cloak, and the heavy linen one beneath it, Jaina still felt the chill of the banshee against the length of her spine, but if Sylvanas hoped it would unsettle her, then she had another thing coming. Jaina had grown up off the waters off Boralus itself, and the chill of a glacier-fed current was her first playground.

"Both the champions of the Horde and the Alliance have clashed against the Old Gods, what … four, five times? That was when we still had armies to throw at them - now we've got, what, farmers? A cohort of miners ready to square wits against the latest recruitment tactics of the Twilight Cult?" Jaina felt the need to point out the lack of any real soldiers for any nation.

"They're still around? I assumed Alleria would have cleared out her competition years ago."

"Competi-" Jaina stammered over the word. "They're not competing, for the Tide's sake!"

"Aren't they?" Sylvanas' voice went cloyingly sweet. "Two groups desperate for the attention of many-tentacled masters?" That wicked grin from before was back, but it carried a spice of something a little more devious within it. "Honestly, I'd always pegged Alleria as a little tamer than that if you get my -"

"You are insufferable!" Jaina knew she was blushing, and she could feel the heat blazing on her cheeks.

"And you are easily flustered," Sylvanas lobbed back, "for a diplomat and leader."

Jaina scowled, " - my point still stands. There is little for Azeroth to use but the Lightforged. The Cenarion Circle and the Earthen Ring are devoted to Silithus itself."

That abated Sylvanas' constant need to torment. "The wound is still there?"

Jaina canted her head. "You knew as well as the Alliance that the Blood War did nothing but drain Azeroth's strength, how is this a surprise?"

"The Blood War was won."

"At a horrible price." Jaina pointed out. "From what Magni told us, the world-soul is barely hanging on. The Farseer is practically bound to the Maelstrom to keep it from tearing open; the Archdruid Council is attempting to staunch the spillover in the Dream. The Tirisfal Guard is working with the Telemancers of Suramar to try and establish a sort of safety net with the known ley-line network -"

"And of the races of the Horde?" Sylvanas interjected, "do you know what they do?"

"I … cannot say that I've kept a close eye on them." That wasn't entirely true, and Sylvanas seemed to see through the falsehood. "Well, what do you know of them?"

Sylvanas sighed, unneeded for someone with no need for air. "I know that they are unable to do more than the basic scraps of survival without the Alliance readying their blades."

Jaina's lips pressed into a thin, bloodless line. Sylvanas' gaze traveled to the sight, and she sighed a second time.

"I can practically hear the lecture you're dying to unleash on me."

Jaina almost launched into that very lecture. It got to the tip of her tongue when she decided to swallow the argument instead. "Back in the Spire…"

Sylvanas stiffened behind her, and that ruby gaze darkened to a dangerous crimson. Jaina worried that she was about to receive a second helping of the banshee's wrath. "I meant what I said: I want to help -"

" - and you're suggesting that a saddle half a league above the ground isn't quite where you feel comfortable taking the moral high road?" Sylvanas drawled, and that dangerous crimson dimmed, just a bit. Before Jaina could protest, Sylvanas continued. "There's wisdom in that. Fine, work on the wards, and I'll let you rage about any nitpicking choice that pleases you to bring up."

Jaina figured that was as good an apology that she'd ever get from the banshee, and so, she nodded and accepted the peace offering, such as it was. She turned back in her seat and tried to use the quiet to collect her thoughts.

Halfway through the flight, Jaina needed to break the silence, and like a child picking at a scab, she pried again when she knew she shouldn't. "The wards, you're so certain I'm going to repair them."

"Hmm?"

"I just want to know why you're taking me at my word; you have no collateral on me."

"Must you needle at everything?" Sylvanas shifted behind her again, her arm brushing against Jaina's side as she adjusted her seat.

"It's not needling; I'm just curious." Jaina resisted the urge to turn around.

"Have you never heard the saying curiosity skins the lynx?" Sylvanas inquired. "Very well, only if you promise to remain quiet the rest of the way." When Jaina nodded, Sylvanas murmured a quiet elven curse before she spoke up again. "You're an honorable woman, and for you, your word is your bond."

That answer did prompt Jaina to turn around, brow arched, and lips pursed. "Much of your war was built upon your claim that honor was useless to the dead."

Sylvanas met her gaze steadily. The crimson of her anger was nowhere to be seen, and all Jaina saw was the sunrise reflected there. "I still stand by that claim, Lord Admiral."

"Then -"  
"However, you are not a corpse."

Jaina blinked. "I ...oh. I see."

Sylvanas hummed softly, then averted her gaze to look out upon the crags below them. Jaina waited for a beat longer, before she turned around to do the same.

As promised, Jaina kept quiet until after the bat began his descent into a narrow, winding ravine. One half was a dangerously thin horse-trail, as Kalira had reported, with one side against the steep ridgeline, and the other breaking off into a neck-breaking incline that ended at a river below it.

Sylvanas guided the bat to settle near the higher vantage point and dismounted. She collected her bow and quiver, and then while she adjusted both on her back, she explained why Kalira thought it a good ambush point. "Last year, we cleared out a harpy nest that'd taken up roost in the northern caverns. Normally, I don't care what the pigeons do, but unruly harpies would inevitably lead to unruly adventurers."

"I hardly think I'd be off-centered by a harpy nest," Jaina pointed out as Sylvanas finished her scan of the ravine, leaning forward to observe the drop-down. "If we're going to sell me tumbling down the way, couldn't it have been something a bit more … in my league?"

Sylvanas glanced back over her shoulder, amusement laced through her ethereal voice. "My apologies, Lord Admiral, I did not realize we needed to ensure that your accident kept your pride intact." She watched as Jaina bristled, and just before Jaina could protest, she continued. "However, I suppose if Alleria had suggested I'd fallen to a gnome ambush, I would have come out of exile just to prove that sort of indignity wrong."

Jaina was not placated, and Sylvanas' mention of gnomes brought to mind her lost apprentice. "There's a flaw in your plan, you realize." Sylvanas' look fixed further on Jaina, and she watched Jaina step up to the overlook much like a cat does a scampering mouse. "See, give off the impression that there's a nest of harpies that an archmage could not best and you'll have tales and rumor that follow - and with them, those same unruly adventurers looking for sport."

Sylvanas grunted. Jaina took that as a sign of acknowledgment.

"Not to mention, there's a risk that the rangari will immediately see through the trick."

"No plan survives contact with the enemy, but go on," Sylvanas settled down into a crouch, looking sidelong at her, "what sort of idea are you turning over?"

"Well, I've been mulling over what you said earlier," Jaina mimicked Sylvanas' crouch, using her staff to brace against so her calves wouldn't start protesting immediately. "The Lightforged, the zeal that drives them. I think you're right, in that the Lightforged don't have an arch-nemesis to strive against anymore."

"Yet earlier you so handily mentioned the Black Empire as a counter, though."

"I did. I do believe the Old Gods are a threat." Jaina doubled down on her previous stance.

"But?" Sylvanas prompted, apparently sensing the thoughts that were already causing Jaina to think and then think again over what she believed set in stone.

"But the Old Gods are subtle - whispers and slow corruption versus the apocalyptic brutality of the Legion. The Lightforged are restless -" Jaina recalled the ferocity that burned in Broken-Horn's gaze once Vereesa had essentially opened up the field for battle. " - give them something to slake their battle-lust upon, and they'll be more amenable to any misdirection you place before them."

Sylvanas' look morphed from a dubious assessment to something more calculating, and if Jaina wasn't fooling herself, a bit of approval. "My my, Lord Admiral, are you suggesting we ambush them?"

"No," Jaina looked beyond Sylvanas, toward the northern peaks and where she assumed harpies would find a suitable nest. "The harpies will ambush them."

"Ah. However, a point of contention: there are no harpies left." Sylvanas pointed out, though her voice didn't carry her usual sing-song when she was mocking Jaina.

Jaina's gaze flicked back to meet Sylvanas' own, and she couldn't help it, Jaina grinned as she pointed out: "yes, but the Lightforged don't know that."

Jaina explained the plan as they made for the abandoned harpy nests. She'd picked up inspiration from Sylvanas' raising of Brittlemane, and the tactics itself from her skirmishes against Nightborne insurgents during the Blood War.

Jaina proposed as they clambered over a particularly gruesome series of rock faces, that Sylvanas might raise the bones of the harpies. Underneath the guise of an illusion, the reanimated creatures could rage and strike, then bleed and fall as fiercely as any of their living brethren.

The two of them refined the idea as they sidled along a footpath. Though illusioned, they would need to explain why the creatures don't fall so easily to sword blows and quarrel bolts. Sylvanas was the one to mention the witch mothers of the harpies - shamans who twisted the restorative elements in dark ways and knitted flesh as quickly as one could breathe.

Jaina recalled some of the flocks in the Barrens - and the wasting toxins that unlucky travelers would arrive at Theramore's small clinic struggling to survive with. She also remembered the poisons that ambitious Horde mercenaries wielded - bolstered by the witch mothers of the isles.

Between them both, the story they wished to tell weaved itself together. Jaina, on a horse that she loaned, was far too busy coaxing the mount along the trail when an ambushing flock of harpies descended upon her. The horse spooked, lost its' balance, and with it, the mage.

There was just … one problem.

It manifested not too long after Jaina teleported over a longer span of the chasm, connecting with the solid ground just as Sylvanas crossed via the native agility of elven rangers. They stood before the maw of the caverns that once hosted a flock of harpies, but instead of finding the scattered corpses ready to be recalled, the place looked like it'd seen a stampede.

Sylvanas picked up the broken fragments of a femur, running her fingers along the flaking ends. "Odd. This isn't the work of scavengers. They've been trampled. Often."

Jaina frowned and moved further into the cave. "Are there salvageable parts?"

"Unsure. I need complete skeletons, or at the very least, bones that aren't shattered or otherwise ruined - then there's nothing for the magic to adhere to."

"Truly?" Jaina was doubtful, and she sounded it as well. Jaina remembered the meat wagons, the abominations, the half-dismembered shambling things that crawled through Icecrown's frozen wastes.

Sylvanas nodded, seemingly ignoring the tone. "I am not a student of the Cult of the Damned, Lord Admiral. I did not spend my years perfecting the art of reanimating flesh and bone -" she caught Jaina's look, which had turned even more incredulous. "What I do is more …" Sylvanas' words twisted in her mouth, coming out with a sneer. "Natural, I suppose."

Jaina's suspicions lowered, just a tad.

"A cruel gift," Sylvanas said, her voice lowering to barely more than a breath on the wind, "from the mad prince. He felt it only fitting that for a commander such as myself, who had so many willing to die just upon my orders - why, it would be only proper that I can call upon those warriors a second time."

Jaina watched as Sylvanas dropped the bone, the femur cracking as it struck against the rock. The pair milled in the entrance to the caverns, both of them at a loss. They'd spent precious hours traversing the chasm to get here, and now without the proper tools with which to ply their misdirection, they were going to have to figure out another ploy, and fast.

Jaina wracked her brain for another option when she frowned. Had that been a tremor? She looked across the way to see Sylvanas still as stone, ears pricked forward. It was the first time Jaina had seen the undead elf's ears move - she hadn't thought it necessary - a reflex from life?

Jaina's attention turned to the ravine beyond the cavern's maw. She felt the tremor again, could feel the quivering rock beneath the leather sole of her boots, and yet, it couldn't have been an earthquake. Each quake lasted barely a second, and they came spaced apart. Almost like -

"Something's coming!" Sylvanas hissed, suddenly at Jaina's side. Her hand clenched down over Jaina's wrist, but there was no need. Jaina was already pulling at the arcane currents, twisting the air around them.

With a pop of pressure, the two disappeared as Jaina's invisibility cloaked them in a distorted wave of magic. They stood, quietly, as the tremors continued, and grew in strength until, rounding the corner of the cavern's mouth, the largest and ugliest ettin that Jaina's ever laid eyes on stepped into view.

The giant was at least double the size of the creatures that plagued the lowlands of Silverpine, and the cave grew dark as the beast shouldered it's way in, blocking the sunlight behind it. Quiet, Jaina and Sylvanas moved to one of the small breaks in the rock wall.

It must have been a nest. Feathers and caked bird filth littered the floor while the walls were scratched in a pictogram language that, under different circumstances, Jaina would love to try and decipher.

It seems her interest didn't go unnoticed. "You are worse than a lynx cub, Proudmoore!" Within Jaina's mind, Sylvanas' voice lacked the ethereal echo of her physical self but was no less disapproving. "Might we focus on the giant problem at hand, here?"

Jaina rolled her eyes but did as suggested. The ettin, even hunched over, made even a Zandalari troll appear childlike in brawn and height. Jaina had not paid much attention during the zoological classes in Dalaran, but her travels with Arthas and her own time spent in the various foothills of the north had taught her several valuable things about the creatures.

The mottled, rocky appearance of its skin was no illusion. Ettin hide was as durable and thick as a dragon's scales, and this one bore the scars and gashes of clashes with people who'd crossed it. Elder ettins developed resistance to magic, shrugging off the nastiest spells with a casual swagger. With one swipe of their hands, they could easily break the neck of a human or elf. With their club, even a mighty Draenei warrior could be at risk.

"Don't you even begin to think about it." Sylvanas warned, though there was no bite to the words that tickled along Jaina's thoughts.

'You don't even know what I'm thinking' Jaina mouthed, glaring at the banshee who was returning the glower just as good as Jaina was giving it.

"Yes, I do." Sylvanas' glare dropped into a resigned shake of her head. "Because I was thinking the same damned thing. Damn it, Proudmoore, I was counting on you to be the rational one here."

Jaina snorted, then let out a muffled gasp when the ettin's ears perked and one head jerked up from the bear carcass it was currently flaying open. One of Sylvanas' hands immediately covered Jaina's mouth, but it was too late.

"What you say?" The rightmost head asked in horribly broken Common. It squinted at its companion, and one hand stilled over the bear.

"Nuttin'," came the other head's reply. "What you say?"

"Nuttin'."

The two heads grunted the matter settled between them. The ettin went back to his work, and Sylvanas removed the hand that cupped over Jaina's mouth when there was no further risk of being discovered.

Jaina swatted away Sylvanas' hand. 'If it kills the Lightforged …' she mouthed, prompting Sylvanas to pinch the bridge of her nose.

"Then I'll have unruly adventures and a whole Light-damned Light Brigade at my doorstep. "Sylvanas turned that crimson stare on the chattering ettin. "There was an ettin similar to the size of this one on Highmountain. The Unseen Path called for an entire brigade to assist in removing it. How do you suppose the two of us do so?"

Jaina smiled, smug. She pointed first to her staff, then as if hesitant on the prowess it presented, looked to Thori'dal slung over Sylvanas' back. Sylvanas interpreted the gesture correctly, and the affronted scowl she delivered almost made up for the tower toss.

"Very well. You understand we can't kill the beast, right? Reanimating it would … probably be impossible. The necromancers under Arthas tried. Their attempts went rather, well, flat."

Jaina almost preferred the banshee ignoring her. She didn't have to deal with the elf's terrible humor then. She lifted her staff, the crystal at the top flickering to life as she began to channel the intent of battle magic around her. Magic crackled as frost laced down her armor and over her body like a second skin, a barrier to cushion any blow that might land upon her.

Opposite her, Sylvanas unslung her bow from her back and pulled at the tie at her quiver, loosening the top wide enough for her to snatch arrows without resistance.

The two of them met gazes for a final time in the safety of the harpy nest.

'One' Jaina began.

"Two," came Sylvanas' response.

'Three' "Three."

As one, they dove into the fray.


	11. Chapter 11

Time crawled to a stop while Jaina twisted out of the nesting alcove, Sylvanas right on her heels. There was a lurch as the arcane spun out at Jaina's control to include Sylvanas into the warp, only to stumble as the very nature of Sylvanas resisted the pull into action. The unexpected lull threw Jaina's battle magic off just enough that her first volley of ice slammed into the cavern wall just beyond the leftmost head.

The ettin jerked up bit by bit, stunned by the sudden noise. The leftmost head was a mess of scars piled one onto the next onto the next. Gaunt cheeks chewed through a bloody chunk of meat as the left head processed what just happened. For one second, it blinked and stared at nothing - then, like molasses, the hunk of flesh dropped from its jowls as it realized the ettin was not alone within the cavern.

After her initial hiccup, Jaina's second ice lance struck true and glanced off the sharp cut of a cheekbone, leaving a streak of ugly, raw skin behind. She fell into her war rotation, the spells coming to her as natural as breathing. As she readied her third bolt, it launched out towards the ettin, the core as dark as Sylvanas' skin, and broke off the ettin's shoulder as the beast brought up his club.

A flurry of ice shards materialized as the air around Jaina became freezing cold and devoid of moisture. They were launched forward with a casual flick of her wrist and followed by a third ice lance.

Dark magic slammed into the ettin's other shoulder, whirling him off balance one way and then the other, rocking the creature back onto his feet. Jaina risked a look over to see Sylvanas nock the fourth arrow as her second and third broke off - skimming along the ettin's neck. The banshee scowled as she unleashed the fourth arrow, trying to pummel through the ettin's hide.

With the time anomaly on their side, Sylvanas was able to roll and duck underneath the first wide swing of the ettin's club as the creature lumbered into a true counterattack. Within the cramped confines of the cavern, Sylvanas' dodging didn't grant her much leeway between the attacks. As she flickered in and out of corporeal form, Jaina caught a wince cross over the banshee's expression as one brutish fist clipped along her shoulder.

"Are you all right?" Jaina called out, working out the last set of spellweaving needed to let loose a frost orb. As her fingers spun the required runes, she tried to keep one eye on the evasive maneuvers of her battle partner.

"Worry about yourself, Proudmoore!" Sylvanas snarled, bending backward to avoid being splattered against the back wall.

Jaina yelped as the shadow of the ettin fell over her as it adjusted to keep Sylvanas on the defensive. She blinked backward, stumbling to stay upright as the ettin stepped through the place where she'd just been. She glared up at the rightmost head - hating the smirk that scrawled along it's broken lips, exposing jagged teeth and rotting breath.

"Hah! Tiny creatures dance!"

"We really - " Sylvanas growled, her bow knocked out of her hand as she sank into shadow. She stuttered back into the physical a little too quickly for it to have been deliberate. " - should be fighting him outside! Do I look like a well-armored warrior?"

Jaina blew out a long breath. She didn't have time to dwell on Sylvanas' tactics; she had her own to deal with. She twisted her fingers and curled her hands around the early tendrils of another frost spell. She hoisted her staff with her other hand, sending out violet streaks of energy that skittered along the ettin's flesh like birds alighting over water.

"Damn it!" Jaina's arcane missiles evaporated into useless motes that only managed to distract the rightmost head. That one looked like it took the greater share of meals, for its facial structure wasn't as highlighted by malnourishment.

She risked a glance over Sylvanas' way and found that the warchief seemed just as stuck as Jaina felt. Every battlefield Jaina encountered Sylvanas upon, the banshee had exploited the terrain, quick, decisive movements that left the enemy dizzy. In the caverns claustrophobic halls, the banshee had very little to exploit. The ettin took up too much of the space for her to pull off a flank, and her eyes blazed as frustration began to drive her.

As the balance of time began to snap back, the difficulty of the terrain started to warp into an advantage for the ettin. It couldn't move, but compared to the two of them, it didn't much need to. Jaina's ice lances broke against its hide, and even Sylvanas' arrows bounced along the rough, mottled skin to leave the ettin agitated but otherwise untouched.

Their earlier cockiness about refraining from killing the beast had morphed into a desperate need not to get killed in return. One of the ettin's hands swung towards Jaina, and ice immediately snapped over her skin and then overlapped until she was encased in a frozen shield that still cracked when it absorbed the blow.

Jaina took the temporary abatement to catch her breath. Sylvanas flipped, dove, and dodged the clumsy sweeps of the ettin's hands, but she was backpedaling now - they both were.

Then time snapped back into its regular flow.

Jaina's ice block melted, and she let that Frost Orb go, and smirked viciously as it coated the rock underneath the ettin with a thick sheet of ice. The whipping winds might not cut deep into that thick hide as the orb went past, but it would make the ettin's life miserable.

Sylvanas rolled forward as the ettin's club curved fast toward her. She flickered - shadow crossed her body - but she didn't fade into the mist as she must have expected to do. Underneath the frozen spell, she dove - right between the ettin's legs. She popped back onto her feet, only to narrowly miss tripping over.

The elven ranger didn't fall over the ice, but Jaina watched seconds tick by as Sylvanas struggled to regain her balance on the ground that was now sheer and smoothed with ice. "Look out!"

Too late.

"HAH!" The ettin crowed, his fist closing around Sylvanas' body. He lifted the banshee with little effort and sneered his victory as Sylvanas struggled. She twisted, and shadow dripped through the space between the ettin's fingers, but she didn't fade out.

Why wasn't she ghosting out?

"Sylvanas!" Jaina shouted, blinking forward. She was inside the reach of the ettin, and with a cry, she swung her staff up, aimed toward the underside of the leftmost head's jaw, and released an arcane blast. Around Jaina, three more explosions from her staff went off in coordination as her illusionary doubles followed her war rotation the instant they were conjured. This close, the concussive force snapped the ettin's head back, knocking the creature into the cavern wall.

One of the nesting alcoves crumbled away, dust exploding into the air around them.

The ettin roared in pain, the gaunt head bobbing on that thick, corded neck at a crooked angle - tongue lolling out of its mouth and eyes fading in and out of a glassy stare. Good. It could be hurt.

The right head swung its gaze between its hurt twin and Jaina. "No!" With the club-wielding hand slackened by the unconscious half of the ettin, it used the weapon it had handy at the time.

"Move, Proudmoore!" Sylvanas yelled as she was hurled forward, and Jaina barely blinked away before the ettin smashed it's makeshift banshee-turned-club into the ground just as Sylvanas got a hand free, half-turned to throw a perfectly aimed dagger into that hateful stare.

A sickening crunch reverberated through the rock.

The ettin made to pull its' hand back and found that it couldn't when Jaina turned her frost onto that hand - not through the thick, mottled skin on the outside, but through the conduit it held within its palm.

The ettin yowled and released the near-frozen banshee. Sylvanas dropped to the ground, and was, for a heart-stopping second, utterly still. Another blink brought Jaina to her side as the ettin yanked back and struck out wildly - now half-blind - against the cavern. There was another rumble. The hair on Jaina's neck stood up - they needed to move. Now.

She made to hoist Sylvanas up, but a cold grip snaked around her waist. Sylvanas used Jaina to help get back on her feet. Without saying a word, she jerked them toward the splash of sunlight revealed as the ettin stumbled away from it. They broke out into the open and turned as the earth collapsed behind them.

The gaunt head's jaw hung at an awkward angle, and several teeth jutted out from between a nasty split in the upper lip. The creature was partly trapped underneath the cave in. Jaina could see one of its hands twitching frantically underneath a pile of rock as streams of black blood oozed out around the digits.

Sylvanas swung her bow onto her back and scowled at the mess before them. Half of the banshee's face was scraped away. Jaina kept darting glances at the exposed muscle and the ugly white of … was that bone?

Why was there no blood?

Sylvanas caught her staring, and for a moment, stared quizzically back at Jaina before she brought a hand up to her face and found the damage. The banshee tugged her hood up high enough that her face was wreathed in darkness. "Well, he's certainly not going to be able to face down a band of zealots any time soon."

Jaina agreed. She half-slumped against her staff, using it to keep herself upright. "Change the story then, I didn't fall in the ravine. I was wounded, came to find shelter, and ran into … that." Breathless, she gestured vaguely toward the struggling monster.

Sylvanas' scowl didn't lessen. She went from observing the trapped ettin to giving Jaina a disapproving once over that made Jaina feel like an apprentice caught sneaking out after curfew. She must have been more tired than she realized because she found herself muttering her thoughts aloud. "I thought only Modera had that look perfected."

Sylvanas snorted. She approached Jaina with a sure, slow gait. "Can you walk?" She inquired, coming to a stop just a foot away.

Jaina nodded and tried to ignore how that motion caused the world to spin around her. She gripped her staff tighter. "I can." She caught the dubious look Sylvanas gave her. "I can! Just … give me a little bit to catch my breath."

Sylvanas hummed, then offered a hand. "Come, up onto the ridge. You can rest -"

"No, I need to see to the wards before I rest." Jaina ignored the hand and took several steps forward. They were shaky, but she managed them. "Once I do, I can just teleport back to Boralus and tell a story about a mountain ettin - might even request for the Unseen Path to handle it."

"Didn't we just agree that unruly adventurers weren't exactly the sort of neighbors I desire?" Sylvanas fell into step alongside her, with only the occasional look back toward the ettin. "Might you have been struck on the head?"

"I'll request the Unseen Path and solidify the story that I was out here - thus prompting the Lightforged to come to Boralus if they're in such a mood to find me," Jaina continued as if Sylvanas hadn't spoken. Pain lanced through her skull as she ascended the cliffs to get out of the ravine. Her muscles trembled, and tiny, electric jolts rocked through her arms as she lifted herself again, and again.

She should have teleported to avoid the exhausting effort, but it would have drained the last of her natural reserves, and now that she had a proper delay between the Lightforged and herself, Jaina wanted the wards up and stable as quickly as she could manage. She could sleep - would sleep once she was back in Boralus, in her bed. Her comfy bed.

Sylvanas moved up the cliff alongside her and quickly passed Jaina in height. Even in death and wounded, Sylvanas' body still carried the innate agility of her people, and when she swung herself up and over the top, Jaina wished just for a second that she'd spent less time bent over war tables and more time outdoors.

Jaina blinked as Sylvanas offered her hand a second time, and chalked it up to sheer exhaustion that she accepted it. Sylvanas hauled her up with a soft grunt of effort and let go as soon as Jaina was safe from toppling back down.

"The runestone stands on one of the low jutting peaks, next to one of the crumbled watchtowers."

"Watchtowers?" Jaina asked as they made their way through the forest. The sparse growth of the trees made this section of the mountains drab beneath the cooler autumn sunlight. The landscape reminded her of the higher reaches of Drustvar - those cold crevices that were nothing but a frosted wasteland patrolled by angry elementals eager to bring down a lost traveler.

"Mm," Sylvanas led them further up until even the trees stopped claiming space for themselves. The wind whistled, and the rock beneath their feet glistened with fresh frost resistant to the sun. Jaina leaned entirely on her staff as they walked, and couldn't help but release a relieved sigh once Sylvanas stopped in front of an otherwise unimpressive monolith near a jumble of what could have once been the boundary of a building's outer walls.

Jaina couldn't even see the glyphs on the runestone; they were so faded from time and elements. Unlike the one in the lower foothills, this one didn't pulse with new power.

"Dormant?" Jaina rounded the monolith. She reached out with her power and felt nothing stir in return.

"Is it? I can't tell."

Jaina lifted her gaze from the stonework to the banshee. "Really? I thought elves -"

"A living elf," Sylvanas corrected. "Something which I, nor my rangers, are not. We can still sense powerful pulses of magic - like your tricks in that blizzard - but the subtle nuances escape us." The banshee glanced over her shoulder to Jaina. "If this isn't suitable for your needs -"

"It's fine," Jaina hurried to cut her off. "I'll get to work, then."

Sylvanas studied her a moment longer, then nodded. "I'll scout and send word to Kalira to meet us here when she's completed her task." She stepped away from her overlook and moved around where Jaina crouched before the monolith. The banshee hesitated, and Jaina swore she heard Sylvanas take in a breath before the crunch of her leather boots disappeared somewhere around the treeline.

Without tool or cipher, and with the wardstone as dead and unyielding as the rock it was carved from; it took Jaina the better part of the day and well into the late afternoon before she finally called it for the time being.

Her headache had returned, along with stiffness to her neck and back that forced her to take unwanted breaks to relieve the strain on her joints. She had hoped that there would have been a ley-line nearby for her to tap into to bolster her natural mana regeneration, but as far as she searched, the ley-lines were little more than scar tissue that scrawled underneath the mountains.

Sylvanas returned just as the sun was sinking into the west. At this altitude, Jaina could watch and marvel at the golden rays turning bronze as they cut through the blight that still stained Lordaeron's capital. The distance allowed her to enjoy the strange twist of color without lingering too long on the horror that spawned it, or that the architect of the destruction was currently striding back up the path with several dead marmots looped over her shoulder.

"Any progress?" Sylvanas asked as her greeting, coming to a stop to look all around the peak. She found something amiss, for she sighed and began moving around in Jaina's periphery as Jaina looked back to the monolith.

"No," Jaina sighed. "Whatever spells this monolith anchored are gone, and I can't figure out which of these glyphs might give me any clue, or lead, or I don't know, answer?" She winced. She sounded like a spoiled child when she spoke. She was about to apologize when she heard the first scratch of flint against steel. Sylvanas was bent over a small triangle of twigs and moss and in the middle of coaxing a small flame to life.

Jaina arched a brow. "What's that for?"

Sylvanas peered up at her through the flames. She paused before she spoke, and Jaina just knew she'd swallowed her original answer. "Humans have abysmal night vision."

"This human is a mage," Jaina pointed out as she lifted her staff for emphasis.

Sylvanas pursed her lips, and her next words came out even more stilted. Jaina realized this was Sylvanas trying to resist her typical commentary. "You need heat and food as well - yes I know you can conjure both," she rushed on, "but that's going to drain your reserves quicker than the sun sets. Besides," she gave the staff an imperious look, "those conjured sweets aren't sustaining at all."

Jaina huffed, but if Sylvanas was attempting civility, she could try to hear her out, and if she wanted to be truthful - the idea of warmth and an actual filling meal were more tempting than maintaining her pride. However, that didn't mean she'd let Sylvanas learn so quickly that her efforts were appreciated. "Ah, I see," she said with a put-on air of revelation. "Yes, I get it now - thank you."

Jaina turned back to the monolith and resisted the urge to peek back at Sylvanas.

It took a minute before: "All right, spit it out."

"Hmm?" Jaina finally allowed herself a glance, and sure enough, Sylvanas stared at her, eyes narrowed and expression as focused as if Jaina was the quarry in a personal hunt.

"You agreed - too readily."

"You'd rather I argue the point?"

If Sylvanas were still alive, Jaina believed she'd have seen the banshee's ears pin back. The look she received was similar to Vereesa's when the youngest sister was irritated. All Sylvanas needed was a lashing tail to paint the picture of a huge, grumpy feline. "I'd rather you'd make sense."

"Well, that's not going to happen." Jaina turned fully from the monolith to watch Sylvanas at work.

Even with the occasional glare tossed her way, Sylvanas went through the motions of setting up a temporary camp with the practiced ease of long years. It might have been nearly twenty years since Sylvanas last needed to camp in the wilderness, but the muscle-memories were apparently still there. The banshee stoked the fire to a pleasant size - one that came with a welcome warmth that Jaina moved to be closer to.

Jaina pulled out the journal she'd scribbled her notes in. With the fire warming her and providing light, she focused on her previous workings concerning the ancient quel'dorei language. It wasn't that dissimilar from modern Thalassian, which was one of the staple languages every mage studied in their early years if they wanted to understand the basics of enchantments and arcane theory - but Jaina had moved on from enchantments to transmutation early in her apprenticeship.

Jaina worked on her translations and the root of the glyphs while Sylvanas made quick work of the marmot. Within the hour, the scent of roasting meat and the crispness of the night's frost drew Jaina's attention away from her readings; the words were swimming on the pages before her, and every rustle in the brush snapped her attention to it like a rabbit wary of a nearby fox. She closed her journal when a speared chunk of meat was thrust underneath her nose.

She followed that up to meet Sylvanas' eyes and quirked a brow in return. She took the offered food because the rumbling of her stomach overwrote any sense of pride or dismissal. Biting into it, Jaina nearly moaned at the first taste of actual food for the past few weeks. She stopped though when she noticed Sylvanas' stare.

She swallowed that bite, then, chalking it up to her insatiable curiosity, asked: "Are you still able to eat?"

Sylvanas leaned back on her heels, the grin disappearing as she pondered the question. "Yes. Though my diet has become a bit more ...narrow regarding what sustains my physical requirements." Sylvanas caught the question in Jaina's eyes before she could even form the words: "I believe the term is an obligate carnivore. I require flesh to mend my own."

Jaina blinked. "That sounds an awful lot like digestion."

"With a dash of necromantic draining - yes, I suppose it does." Sylvanas didn't take any of the marmots for herself, though.

Jaina fell quiet after that, focusing instead on curbing the sharp edge of hunger that the scent and taste of actual food had awoken in her. Sylvanas seemed to approve of the quiet because she stood up and went to the monolith herself. Her gloved fingers trailed along the nearly-gone swirls and loops of the ancient glyphs.

Jaina watched her and observed a rare glimpse into the woman that carried the mantles of Warchief and Banshee Queen. She found that Sylvanas was no less impressive, but there was a weariness that weighed heavily on the elven woman's shoulders.

"I haven't made much progress with it," Jaina admitted after a while. "There are some repeating patterns with the language down below the temple, but there's no response to any of my spellcasting. It's like the wardstone is dormant."

"I sense a 'but' in there," Sylvanas broke out of her quiet musing to fix Jaina with a curious look.

"There's a faint connection to the ley-line nexus that runs throughout Falor'Thalas. The deterrent enchantment is feeding off of the innate energy." Jaina finished her last few bites and shuffled closer to point out the particulars of what she was talking about. It was hard to explain from a distance, after all.

Jaina took Sylvanas' hand as she would any other student, or mage, and guided the banshee's fingers over the various pictographs as she spoke. "While this is certainly ancient quel'dorian writing - I haven't found a concealment enchantment at all. I might not have taken Modera's master classes, but even with considerable leeway for cultural drift and dialects -" Jaina sat back on her heels and huffed a loose strand of hair away from her face. "Sylvanas, I'm pretty convinced Falor'Thalas never had a concealment array like Quel'Thalas."

Jaina looked to Sylvanas for confirmation or dismissal of her assumption and found Sylvanas still and staring at where Jaina's hand still covered her own. Jaina coughed and tried to extract her hand without the conversation turning awkward.

It didn't work.

Sylvanas snatched her hand away, and tension crawled into the space between them.

Jaina went to apologize and looked up. She met with the ugly reminder of the ettin-encounter. Close-up, Jaina could see how the fall had torn away much of Sylvanas' cheek. Without blood messying the wound, Jaina could make out the fine detail of muscle and sinew. Again, Jaina's gaze skittered over that blush of bone.

"Does it hurt?" Jaina asked, quiet.

Sylvanas hesitated. "No," she said. Jaina's gaze lifted slightly to meet that crimson one. "It doesn't feel much like anything." Sylvanas' gaze rose to meet hers and damned if Jaina could ever have been prepared for the open expression she encountered before both of them looked askance. Jaina to give Sylvanas the privacy to recover her mask, and Sylvanas to collect herself.

"Sorry," Jaina said. "I tend to get a bit carried away when -"

"Don't apologize," Sylvanas' ethereal echo softened as she glanced back to recapture Jaina's gaze. There was an indescribable shift in the banshee's expression before she continued, "well, you should apologize for quite a few things, but never about your enthusiasm for your research."

"I -" Jaina didn't know how to answer that. So, she ducked her head and allowed the unusual warmth to pass through her before she returned to meeting that crimson gaze. Then, she processed Sylvanas' words in their entirety. "Wait - why am I apologizing?"

Sylvanas chuckled, and for once there was no mockery in her laughter. Jaina found herself smiling along.

Sylvanas pulled away first, rising as she did. "Well, your aim is atrocious, for one."

"My aim is atrocious?" Jaina played along, rising to match Sylvanas. "At least I was firing off shots. I didn't realize elves needed to get a few spins off before they joined a fight."

"Now, now, Proudmoore; just because I have managed to incorporate flair and substance into my battlefield prowess -"

Jaina snorted but found herself grinning regardless. "Is that what the kids are calling it these days?"

"I did not hear you complaining when I - what's the crude term - ah yes: 'tanked' so you could finally do something with that sparkle-staff you carry around."

"Sparkle-staff?!"

Sylvanas nodded, and when their gazes met for the third time, Jaina felt a delicate warmth run along her neck. Jaina broke this glace first. "So, uh, the deterrent spell - it's a modern design?"

Sylvanas went along with the subject shift. "Indeed, by Conjurer Vah'rallen."

It took Jaina a moment to place the name with a face. "The Horde claimed a number of the Champions of the Legion War, didn't they?"

Sylvanas shrugged, "I know talent when I see it."

"Uh-huh." Jaina paused, "so Conjurer Vah'rallen established the deterrent -"

"In haste. We discovered Falor'Thalas during the Cataclysm - the tremors had disturbed a few of the more unfriendly sort of mountain neighbors. At the time, we were going to present it to the Reliquary to curry favor with Silvermoon but plans changed."

"When -"

"The night before the Battle for Lordaeron," Sylvanas answered. "The presence of the plague children was a secret even to the majority of the Horde, and I preferred it that way. It was supposed to be temporary."

Jaina watched Sylvanas' face as the elf spoke. There was something beyond the stillness, something in the way her deathly echo wavered with a touch of wistfulness. She thought back to the months after the induction of the islands into the two factions.

"I believe I wasn't entirely truthful -"

"Rarely a revelation given that up to a few months ago we were sworn enemies -" Sylvanas drawled but gestured for her to continue.

"- about the situation of the Lightforged in Boralus." Jaina did so after an unamused glare tossed Sylvanas' way. The banshee merely quirked a brow, waiting. "After Derek … returned … it devastated my mother. It nearly ruined me. I … I was one of the voices that clamored for Anduin to give command of the armies to the High Exarch."

Sylvanas watched her in return, "I knew that already. We knew the Lightforged were a threat greater than most of either army's caliber - even with the Azerite. After all, the Horde also lent aid in the Argus campaign."

"Why would you want the Lightforged anywhere near command then?" Jaina asked.

"Well," Sylvanas reached out a hand to smooth over the stone they stood before, and her voice went distant as she delved back into the memories. "At the time, I wanted the zealots chomping at the bit for command because I'd believed that, due to Alleria's … newfound abilities … she'd be immediately resistant - that it'd cause tension between the two extremes that the Alliance had brought in. I hadn't expected Alleria to just … allow that man an uncontested run of the show."

"I don't think either side expected Tyrande, either."

Sylvanas laughed a raspy breath more so than a sound. "Spirits, no, even my most devious, dark dreams for splitting the Alliance leadership down the middle didn't conjure that outcome."

Jaina turned back to the monolith, studying it with Sylvanas by her side. "So, Falor'Thalas…?"

"Just children now, well, and your recruits."

"My recruits?" Jaina looked to her for clarification and immediately started bristling at the grin she received.

"Why, what else should I call the rangers, now? You offered them target training practically every day."

Jaina must have developed a concussion after the tower because she found herself just rolling her eyes. "I'm teleporting you back to the ettin cave," she muttered and went back to the journal she left by the fire; Sylvanas' laughter dancing in her ears.

The next two days were devoted to trying to break through the monolith's mystery and uncover the secrets it hid. Jaina had exhausted every magical avenue she could think of, and with the sun bright and gleaming overhead on the second day, she threw her journal at the monolith with a frustrated yell.

That prompted a curious sidelong glance from the banshee who currently sat upon one of the flat rocks of the plateau with one of Jaina's parchment sheets and a charcoal nub. "From the tantrum, am I to believe that you had no success?"

"Whoever designed this ley-line network was high on bloodthistle -"

"I think we cultivated bloodthistle first in Quel'thalas -" Sylvanas caught her glare and returned it as a cheeky grin before she sobered and left her perch, scooping up the thrown journal along the way. She came to a halt next to Jaina, journal extended. "Show me?"

Jaina tossed her another glare, but this one was half-hearted, and borne more of defeat than any malice. She took the journal back and flipped it open to the page where she'd spent time translating the few glyphs Sylvanas had been able to discern from the timeworn stone. "I tried the variations you suggested, and there's still no response. The ley-line is completely resistant to any Concealment."

Sylvanas stepped alongside her to run her fingers through the grooves. She quietly mouthed words as her hands ran through the swirls and dips of the incantations. "I don't understand," she dropped her hand away. "This is practically a predecessor to the runestones of Eversong. I'm certain that An'daroth held the same passages along the temple walls."

Jaina believed her, but her results were still coming up the same. Any of her attempts to pull magic into a Concealment were just drained away. She'd already attempted a ritual casting four times and each time had watched the arcane disappear without effect. She couldn't even tell if it'd reached the leylines at all.

"Vah'rallen had been elven, correct?" She asked, closing the journal a second time and clipping it back to her belt. Sylvanas nodded, having returned to Jaina's side now that she'd confirmed that she'd given Jaina the exact words that had been on the monolith itself. "That explains how he could manage the deterrent - he could see the damned ley-lines."

Sylvanas' ear twitched, and the novelty of the gesture occupied Jaina's attention momentarily. Over the course of the days, the banshee's wounds had healed, and with that, she'd been a bit more expressive. "You can't?"

"I … no?" Jaina met the banshee's baffled gaze. "Humans cannot read ley-lines like elves -"

"Yes, of course, humans can't, everyone knows that," Sylvanas waved that away, "however, I'd believed you could. You drew so much power whenever we fought, and that blizzard you conjured?"

"I can sense them, but I can't see them. It's … like I can sense the current around me, but I cannot see the shape, or study how I affect it."

"Color me impressed then, Proudmoore," Sylvanas said after another quiet pause.

"Can you see them?" Jaina asked, curious.

"Were I alive, and given enough time to meditate and draw the arcane through me?" Sylvanas canted her head as she pondered the question. "Yes, I believe so."

Jaina tapped her fingers over her lips as she mulled on that piece of information. "So, I need to channel the arcane through you to the point where it overrides the natural entropic drain of the necromantic energy within you -"

"Which sounds horribly uncomfortable, what's the next option?" Sylvanas shuddered.

"I … didn't have a second option?" Jaina shrugged, "unless you can somehow give me the ability to have elven sight…" she trailed off, a dangerous idea formulating in her mind.

Sylvanas caught on to her lapse in conversation and must have been aware that Jaina's thoughts were going somewhere a little more dangerous because she rounded on the mage and fixed her with a suspicious look. "I don't like it when strange mages develop ideas, Proudmoore. Kindly cease whatever you're beginning to brew -"

"Can you possess others still?"

Sylvanas' brow furrowed as if she didn't understand the question. "I … beg pardon?"

"You're called the Banshee Queen - and it's rumored that banshees can ...possess peopl- why are you staring at me like that?"

"Because I'm deeply concerned I gave you brain damage when I threw you out the tower!" Sylvanas strode forward, removing her gloves. She set the back of one hand against Jaina's forehead and leaned in close enough that Jaina felt the chill of Sylvanas' breath against her face.

"Oh, now you're worried about lasting damage?" Jaina snarked, then yelped when Sylvanas pinched her with her other hand. "Ow! What was that for?"

"Reflex testing. Your brain stem is still intact and functioning, so the trouble lies in wherever humans keep their impulsivity contained." Sylvanas muttered and pulled back enough to give Jaina a concerned once-over. She stepped back only when Jaina conjured up an arcane barrier to force space between them.

"I'm fine!"

"You most certainly are not - you just suggested to - to me - of all people - that I possess you!"

"I did not suggest anything of the sort! I just asked a question!"

Sylvanas snorted, "never nock an arrow you're not prepared to fire."

Jaina scoffed. She crossed her arms and fixed Sylvanas with a stubborn stare. "Well, can you?"

Sylvanas easily met her stance and her glower pound for pound. The elven ranger stood a few inches taller even without the riding boots, and she used it to her advantage now. "To answer the question in the academic sense: yes, I can still possess others."

"Thank you, that's all I wanted to know."

Sylvanas snorted, and Jaina took the higher road in ignoring that response. She moved to Sylvanas' side to give the monolith the full force of her displeasure. The rock, being ancient and very much not alive, didn't seem to care that Jaina currently hated it and what it stood for.

"I have never attempted possession on someone who's soul I particularly cared about keeping around at the same time," Sylvanas' voice broke into Jaina's thoughts. Jaina didn't turn her head. She allowed Sylvanas the privacy to speak without Jaina's eyes on her. "Normally, when we possess a body - we drain the spirit within to maintain the possession." Sylvanas sighed, loudly.

Jaina was beginning to learn that those sort of exaggerated responses were the banshee's tells that she was entering uncomfortably private topics of conversation, so she said nothing. Just waited. It worked before, after all.

" - and I did just rescue you from a mountain ettin, and fed you for the past few days - so draining your soul for a simple ley-line feels rather counterintuitive, don't you think?"

And there was the snark - the sarcastic veneer that coated the banshee's words. It was as much a shield as the ice barrier that would shimmer into life around Jaina.

"What if I meditate to draw the arcane through me - would that be enough to sustain the possession without draining my spirit?"  
"I knew you were thinking it," Sylvanas muttered, " you're like a lynx cub with a snake… fine - I'll indulge. Yes, theoretically, that could protect your energy while I occupy the space in your body where you should be - and you realize how utterly insane this sounds?" Sylvanas forced Jaina to look at her, and concern dimmed the crimson to a softer heat. "This could kill you, Proudmoore. You said it yourself, the ley-lines are practically dead here and -"

"We wouldn't need the ley-lines," Jaina said, already forming the idea in her mind. It would be revealing one of her most well-kept secrets, and risking giving all of her advantages to, essentially, the enemy … and yet…

Sylvanas followed Jaina's gaze to her staff. "Your conduit? That staff will be drained faster than you could take in a breath, Proudmoore. We're talking - I don't know - bathing in a moonwell meditation, and even then, I'm not sure that it would be more appealing than your lifeforce. The necromantic magic favors life over all other flavors."

"What about Titan?"

"What about the Titans?"

"Just … Sylvanas, this might be our only option."

"No, we have the option of leaving things alone - or my rangers taking the children somewhere else -"

"Where in Azeroth could they go without the Light eventually finding them?" Jaina asked. "Once the Lightforged learn of them -" she shook her head. "I don't know. I don't want to know."

"Why do you even care? This has nothing to do with what Vereesa asked of you."

Jaina shrugged, helpless, "because I do?"

"Not an acceptable answer, Proudmoore." Sylvanas's grip on her shoulders grew tighter. That crimson heat bore into her own eyes until Jaina was certain Sylvanas was studying the very lines of her spirit. "You are asking me to possess you - an act that could kill you. 'Because' is not good enough." She released Jaina. "Especially after I nearly killed you once already."

"Sylvanas…"

"Oh no, you don't get to do that."

"Do what, call you by your name?" Jaina blinked.

"Yes, exactly." Sylvanas sneered. "I am the Warchief. I am the Banshee Queen. I am the Scourge of Teldrassil." With every title, she stalked toward Jaina. With every title, the shadow began to mist around her edges. That temper that Jaina provoked in the tower was returning.

And Jaina had an idea. A terrible, brilliant idea that needed that temper to explode.

"You were those things -"

"I still am!"

"No - you're an exiled banshee who only rules children now -"

"And you're a mage with a martyr complex!" Sylvanas was nearly all-mist now, and the heat of her eyes burned through her cheeks, infusing her with a mockery of the blush of life. "At first I couldn't understand why you'd so willingly turn your back on your supposed morals to assist me but then, after the tower - after the ettin - now that you're suggesting possession - I realize it's just a way for you to seek out whatever oblivion you've been hunting for Lord Admiral."

Jaina waited until she was sure the banshee was truly dematerialized, then blinked forward into that mist. All around her the shadow twisted and coiled. She felt the brush of a hand here or the scouring heat of a gaze there, and in the eye of that hateful storm, Jaina drew on the power locked away in her staff - locked away in the very core of herself.

And let it go.

The stolen essence of Lei Shen infused the air. Jaina smelled ozone and the luxurious heat of a thunderstorm. She allowed it to saturate the world, seep into the darkness and tantalize and then?

She snapped it back within herself, and the darkness followed.

…

She stood on the shore and faced a vast, open ocean. In the sky, a thunderstorm raged and churned from horizon to horizon. Lightning illuminated the world in heartbeats of heat and light between bouts of darkness.

She felt a tug behind her. She turned to see a field of flowers, pallid and wisping away in the howling wind.

"Is this…?" She asked herself.

"Yes." She answered.

And then She knew nothing but darkness.


End file.
